Organizational Change Management: Understanding Types Of Power And Their Effects On National Culture

Types of Power in Organizational Change Management

Organizational change management is considered as a framework that manages the influence of new process of business, amendment in organizational structure within business. Power is necessary for the organization o change the management. In this essay the types of power will be describing along with positive as well as negative aspects. Culture has a nature of collective phenomenon which is used in learned models of thinking. It is acquired in the early childhood when a person is more excited to learning. This essay will be exploring the dispute that the use and acceptance of power affects the national culture in the programs which is initiating for the change. Hofstede’s cultural dimensions will reflect in this essay with clear understanding.  The sixth dimensions will be reflecting in this essay and each element will be discussed widely. In which manner power should be used in change management and its effect will be introducing in this essay.

Power is the way to get a party to do something and it is the capability of an individual’s to obtain a desired outcomes. There are many types of power which can be used in the order to change the management. Power is not negative on its own. The use of power by manager in the organization defines the nature of power. There are various theories which are being used in change management such as sociological theory of power and organizational theory of power. In the context of sociological theory of power, the use of power within organization is to control the employees and power is considered as the associated with knowledge. To change the program in the organization power is being used to aware all people of organization for their position and responsibility towards attaining the goal. In the context of organizational theory power, the nature of power is hidden and unconscious. Change agent should have knowledge and authority of different types of power such as coercive power, formal power, expert power, moral power, referent power and relationship power. Coercive power is the power which is being used by manager to fire subordinates. Coercive power generates furtive defiance and opposition among individuals (Cummings et. al., 2014). Formal power is the power that provide and individual to amend corporate structures, make effective compensations system and distribute resources differently. These elements are essential in the organization to change the management. To change the management, expert power is necessary ingredient to transform the process. The leaders who have expert power are more positive and have a different ability to see the issues of organization. Moral power is unique quality of change agent in the organization because with moral power, leaders of the organization define the vision and mission of the organization to the employee with inspirational way. Referent power holds by patriotism, celebrities and other well- respected people. An individual who has referent power are outstanding candidates. The last type of power is relationship power which contributes in change management hugely by providing favor nature (Brulle, et. al., 2014).

Positive and Negative Aspects of Power in Organizations

Power has negative as well as positive aspects in the organization. Power is not the thing that makes an individual unique and superior from other. It is the authority of an individual that who has power, should give contribution in the organization to enhance the productivity of the employees. If the use of power is being taken in positive manner, organization can move in the path of growth and in the opposite way, employees of the organization and the aim will become opposite. The positive aspects in the organization through using power are new opportunities come in the organization, encouragement of innovation enhances, attitude of employee improve and the position of organization remains same. The progress of change management is totally depends on the use of power (Gruber et. al., 2015). It is not necessary that the nature of power will same with every employee. It has been found that power is able to change the way of information and process which is perceived by employee. Along with positive impact of power on the organization, there are some negative influences which can be hurdle in the growth of an organization. There are so many reasons that force organization for change such as financial concerns, acquisition of departments and expanding markets. The use of power is being done in the organization strictly; the outcome will come in the form of mental stress, loss of loyalty, increment in time of accomplishing task and changing in life style of employee. Another negative effect of using power incorrect way is to more disruptive work environment (Aldy, et. al., 2015). The resisting of an employee may reason of disturbance regarding the change management staff. The negativity of employees will spread among other employees of staff and encourage them to act in same manner, which can be the cause of unrest among staffers.

Hofstede’s cultural dimension is a theory of cross-cultural communication. It is developed by Greet Hofstede. This theory defines the effects of a culture of society and the value of its members. Along with that it describes the relations of their theory with the behavior. Hofstede has six dimensions of culture. It is power distance index, Individualism Versus Collectivism, Uncertainty Avoidance Index, indulgence Versus Restraint, Masculinity Versus Femininity and Pragmatic Versus Normative. Power distance index is the degree of inequality that exists and it is being accepted by everyone without power. It is categorized in to two forms low PDI and High PDI (Samaha, et. al., 2014). The character of high PDI is large gaps in compensation, centralized organization. On the other hand the characteristic of low PDI is flatter organization and employees as well as supervisors in the organization are considers as equal. Individualism Versus Collectivism refers the strength of the ties which people have to their society and group. The feature of high IVD is respect for privacy and enjoyment of challenges while the low IDV contains the work of people for intrinsic rewards. Masculinity Versus Femininity defines the allocation of rules and responsibility among men and women (Rallapalli, et. al., 2015). High MAS refers the importance of money and repudiation and strong egos whereas low MAS defines the relationship oriented and the main focus on MAS is improvement of quality of life. Uncertainty Avoidance Index introduce that how people can cope with anxiety in better manner. The characteristics of high UAI are conventions of societal and when the people are allowed to express aggression on situation. Low UAI refers the less sense of urgency and allowed to give opinion about innovations and change management.  Pragmatic Versus Normative is also known as the long term orientation and it strongly attached with nationalistic. PRA is defining in two terms that is pragmatic and normative. Indulgence Versus Restraint is a sixth dimension that allows people to have fun and enjoy life in case of high IVR. It has been categorized into two terms that is high indulgence and high restraints (Seligman et.al., 2014).

Hofstede’s Cultural Dimensions and Power-Related Aspects of Culture

The power related aspect of Hofstede’s cultural dimension has been mentioned above along with it characteristics. Culture is learned by an individual while the nature of human is inherited. It has been found that the person within all cultures have different perception, values, beliefs, values and preferences. Hofstede recognizes the dimensions of cultural that are accepted by globally and are presentable in every aspects of life that involves practices of child rearing, education, employment and the practice of health care (Venaik, et. al., 2013). There are six dimension of Hofstede. There are few examples of cultural dimension that reflects the power of Hofstede’ cultural dimension. Individualism-collectivism comes under societal not in an individual. It is the dimension which may affect the perceptions of an individual of disability.  Power distance is the dimension that refers to the extent of fewer members who are not powerful for organization. Power distance is measured through from the perspectives if the manager or leader, who have the ablity to lead the team by holding power (Bakir, et. al., 2015). For this dimension, Hofstede stated that the members of societies are unequal but some of them are more unequal than others. An individual who belongs with a low power distance background of cultural can express acceptance and no acceptance more easily with suggestion (Matusitz et. al., 2013). Masculinity-femininity dimension is addressed in the term of societal and it refers the distribution of values between the male and females. In the culture of feminine, the responses of emotional can be judged in a clear way. Uncertainty avoidance dimension bring the power in the comfort level with unstructured situations. The person who belongs from strong uncertainty avoidance culture background might feel a need for a prognosis definitive and timeline. On the other hand the person who belongs from weak uncertainty avoidance background might feel comfort ability with unknown and they have less need of time line and expected outcomes. There are two type of fosters that is long-term orientation fosters address the long term orientation and short term orientations foster virtues regarding the present and past as well.  Indulgence in the point of view of cultural value reflects towards a view of control of personal life on the other hand restraint as a value of cultural towards a view of helplessness and has not control (Schmitz, et. al., 2014).

The comparison of the power-related aspects of Hofstede’s dimensions between Australia and Singapore is describing below.  Australian culture and Singapore culture has been explored by Hofstede’ cultural. In the comparison of power distance, Australia scores low in the dimension that is 36 whereas Singapore leads in high that is 74. Individualism dimension scores of Australia are high and Australia scores on 90 while Singapore scores on low that is 20 which is collectively society.

Comparison of Power-Related Aspects of Hofstede’s Dimensions between Australia and Singapore

In the context of masculinity, the score of Australia is 61 which are considered as a masculine society. The people of Australia have proud of their achievements and success. The score of Singapore is 48 that are in the middle of the scale. It is more sided on feminine. Conflicts in private in Singapore are neglected and people focus on work life. The uncertainty avoidance dimension of Hofstede of Australia is 51 which are very intermediate. On the other hand the scores of Singapore of uncertainty avoidance dimension are 8 which are very low. It has been found that the citizen of Singapore abide too many rules because of high PDI. The society of Singaporeans is fine. In the dimension of long term, Australia scores 21 which comes under normative whereas the scores of Singapore in the dimension of long term is 72 which reflects a qualities of cultural that support long term investment including thrift, sustained efforts and perseverance. Indulgence dimension score of Singapore is 46 while the indulgence dimension score of Australia is 71 which is high in the comparison of Singapore (Hofstede , 2013).

French & Raven’s ‘Five Bases of Power’ defines the scope of power. It contains legitimate, reward, expert, cohesive and reverent. Culture is considered as the collective phenomenon. Person learned things and adequate during his childhood when they are more sensitive and eager to learn new things. This thing could be done through ongoing experiences in school, groups, neighborhood, and religious group.  It has been researched by Hofstede that every country has similar issue but the way when they address the issue is different. Legitimate power has the nature of unstable and national culture influence on legitimate power strongly because once the position is lost then the legislation power will disappear. National culture enhances the nature of reward power. Coercive power categorized into threats and punishment and it will get influenced by national culture. Expert power gets valued when someone has a efficient knowledge of subject. Referent power comes from when someone do respect of others and national culture influences referent power because people learn these adequacy from his neighborhood and surroundings.

It has been concluded that power is essential in the business to change the program in management. It is important that the use of power should be done in positive way. It is depend on an individual who has the power. Various kinds of power have been discussed in this essay which gives clear understanding about the power. Power can be positive or negative. The use of power is being done in the favor of growth of the organization then the behavior of leaders or manager towards their follower or employee would be positive. This attitude of leaders are manager will bring the progressive situation and enhance the productivity among the employees on the other hand the use power is being done with attitude and ego then the progress will decline of the organization. In this essay the sixth dimension of Hofstede’s cultural dimension has been discussed. These dimensions are Individualism Versus Collectivism, power distance index, Uncertainty Avoidance Index, indulgence Versus Restraint, Masculinity Versus Femininity and Pragmatic Versus Normative. These dimensions are accepted by globally. The comparison of Australia and Singapore by using Hofstede’s cultural dimension has been mentioned that provide better understanding of each elements in the context of comparison.

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