Question

Explain power bases. How does one build power within an organization? How are power and politics related within an organization?

Answer 1

Power refers to the ability that makes the individual to do something or take action accordingly so that the individual or individuals behave in a certain way. The five forms of power include: -

• Coercive Power – This is the power by which a person can force other individuals to do something against their will. It is the power of dominance which focuses on compliance.
• Reward Power – This is the opposite of Coercive power where one person compensates others for the work done by them. The rewards can be bonuses, rise in the salary or other non-monetary benefits that can appeal the team members.
• Legitimate Power – This is the power by which the individual has the formal authority to take actions. This is the most common power that is exercised at workplace. This type of power is not permanent in nature and goes away as soon as the formal authority is given to someone else.
• Referent Power – This is the power by which the person attracts others with his charisma and fame. When people are liked by others, it gives them referent power. The person is often seen as a role model. Celebrities have referent power which attracts others.
• Expert Power – This is the power by which the individual use his skill and knowledge to attract others which can be useful for them. The people with this power are highly intelligent and perform different roles in the organization.

The power bases that lie within the individual include:-

Coercive Power –

• This type of power sometimes can turn into physical threat to others.
• This can create negative environment at work.
• Lack of competition and team work.
• May lead to dissatisfaction of job.
• Employees will try to meet the expectation of the leader and would not go extra mile to excel at work.
• Example of Coercive power is power of the boss over their junior staff which make them to punish the juniors if they are not meeting the deadlines.

Referent Power –

• Referent power helps in influencing others through the person’s abilities thus make them positive about things.
• It motivates others to be like the person who has referent.
• This power has lots of responsibility but can be lost easily because of certain circumstances.
• Example - The CEO connects with people and the organization by influencing them and employees admire, respect and trust him or her.

The power bases that are derived from the organization include:-

Legitimate Power –

• The team members or employees obey the individual with legitimate power as he is appointed for that role and has formal authority to reward or punish his members.
• It has the sense of responsibility towards the organization and thus guide, manage and support the team members in their job.
• It creates a positive environment at workplace.
• It focuses on meeting the organizational goal thus improving the performance of the organization.
• It motivates the employees to give highest level of performance.
• Example - Legitimate power of managers to assign tasks to his or her juniors.

Reward Power –

• This type of power create positive environment at workplace.
• People gets motivated to achieve the reward thus will go extra mile to meet and exceed the target.
• Increase in competition and team work.
• This can also help in improving the performance of the organization.
• Employees will have job satisfaction.
• Example is Reward power of management to promote an employee.

Expert Power –

• It helps in fulfilling organizational responsibilities.
• It helps in gaining trust and respect of others.
• It helps in encouraging others to give highest level of performance.
• Example - The employees of IT department has expert power of information technology.

Organizational politics refers to the behavior or efforts that are made unofficially or in an informal way to increase their power and fulfill their motives within the organization.

The role played by internal politics and power in organizations include both positive and negative effect:-

• It helps in influencing the behavior of other employees and helps in increasing the efficiency.
• Organizational politics and power improves interpersonal relationships.
• These play important role in dealing with the change process.
• These also influence negative environment when people are more concerned about self-serving.
• These create negative work environment if the group ignores organizational goals.

Organizational politics and power impact the total quality in different ways. These are:-

• These lower the individual's output who are involved in politics and affect the overall productivity.
• Internal politics affects the concentration of other and they become less likely to focus on their work quality.
• These create negative environment which spoil the relationship of individuals. This makes them avoid collaborative work or team work.

• Internal politics change the attitude of individuals and make them lose interest at work. Politically driven organization ignores hard work of employees.