Power And Politics In Organizational Management

Sources of Power within an Organization

Discuss about the Power and Politics in Organizational Management.

According to the author of the article, power is closely connected to the organizational cultural and behavioral issues like employee satisfaction, organizational commitment and last but most importantly the employ performance. As described by the author, the sources of power are hugely important for the successful exercise of leadership within an organization. As per the author’s discussion, for a successful leadership, exercise of the legitimate and referent power is necessary. A coercive pattern of power exercise is always harmful for the organizational culture and success. Moreover, the author has found from his research that it is important for the organizations to giving away the power among the employees within an organization.

According to the author, there are a certain sources of power within an organization which are typically responsible for crating distinguishable pattern of result. He has mentioned that there are 5 sources of power within an organization: legitimate power, reward power, coercive power, expert power and referent power. With the help of the legitimate power people can b influenced by the authority of a position. It can make people work under a protocol, but it is not efficient for crating motivation. On the other hand, reward power may create motivation as it uses the strategy of providing the martial and intangible things those the employees want. With coercive power the people can be made conformed to the directions, but it will create de-motivation and dissatisfaction. The expert power can influence people with the knowledge and last but most importantly, the referent power can collect enthusiastic and unquestioning trust and loyalty. Henc, the author has suggested it has the best way of power control within an organization.

The author have also discussed that in the modern day organizations it is needed to opt for empowerment of the employees. With a democratic approach, better participation and effective use of power can be mad possible. Moreover, a leader needs to exercise very kind of power sources, depending on the organizational situation.

Power exercise and political play is inevitable within an organizational setup. Power is important for any kind of decision making and it automatically comes with the exercise of organizational politics. Organizational power and organizational politics are typically interconnected and interdependent. However, the authors have found that it is important for the peoples of an organization to take part in the organizational politics. It creates a power dimension within an organization. However, according to the authors, it is important for the organizations to b aware of the negative impact of organizational politics. Moreover, as concluded by the authors of this particular article, exercise of coercive power by the management may lead an organization to failure.

Empowerment of Employees in Modern Organizations

It may cause disruption of the organizational political dimensions and the team morale. The authors have found that the organizations which are on the threshold of prosperity, need to opt for sectional interests. It will be helpful for them to reducing the employee frustration, friction and conflicts among the members. Moreover, the authors have that organization is an ever changing entity.  With perpetual bargaining, repeated coalitions and influence tactics the organizational players uphold the enterprises. Henc, it can be clearly identified that for the survival of th organizational and its culture, politics is fundamentally important. Henc, the authors have suggested that to eradicate issues related to the organizational power tussle and political conflict, the players or the executives may use the strategy of bargaining and communication. It is important to establish such an organizational culture, which will be helpful in upholding communication among all the power stature and political lobbies.

Now, if a compare and contrast with the previously selected articles can be done, it can be noticed that, the selected articles have an underlying consent about the rejction of coercive power culture. As mentioned by Amarjit Singh the referent and expert power has a number of good impacts on the employee motivation, organizational culture and employee motivation. It helps in acquiring a positive organizational and employee performance. On the other hand, as opined by the author, a coercive power exercise creates an abusive work culture and end up in organizational failure.

This particular opinion has been strongly supported by the articles of Fred C. Lunenburg and Bernard Oladosu Omisore and  Augustina Nwaneka Nweke. Both the articles have suggested the rejection of the coercive power sources within an organization. However, the article of Amarjit Singh has identified the positive and negative factors of the power sources with vivid discussions, whereas, the article of Fred C. Lunenburg has suggested the rejection of the coercive power source depending on some theoretical discussions.

On the other hand, the article by Cameron Anderson and Sebastian Brion has identified that an autocratic source of power has negative impact on the organizational performance level. When all the other selected articles have discussed the power issue depending upon the social and managerial perspective, the article of Cameron Anderson and Sebastien Brion has analyzed it under the light of psychological concept. However, in the conclusion of the article, the authors have suggested that it is important for the CEOs or the power players of an organization not to be autocratic or self-serving. As mentioned by them in this particular article that the self-serving attitude of the higher level of executives face them the loss of power and credibility.

Influence of Power and Politics in Organizations

In the article of Fred C. Lunenburg, the author has mentioned that in the modern organizational approach, it is need to opt for a democratic approach of power exercise. He has also mentioned that with the division of power, it is possible to gain a better control over the employees. The same idea has been supported by the article of Cameron Anderson and Sebastien Brion but in different mode. These two authors have mentioned that a self-serving CEO not only disrupts the personal credibility as a leader, but also upst th team culture and employee performance.   

The same idea has been supported by the article of Bernard Oladosu Omisore and Augustina Nwaneka Nweke. With a different approach and context thy have supported the importance of communication within the organizational process and relation. As argued by the authors, for maintaining better team management and organizational conformity, it is important to maintain an open communication within the organization. It will be helpful in eradicating unhealthy organizational power clashes. On the other hand, Amarjit Singh has mentioned that information flow within an organization is typically important for the success of an organization.   As mentioned by the author, information is opposite to the uncertainty, which is typically propelled by an autocratic leader. Henc, it is important for the organizations to encourage communication with the organizational setup.

Last but not the least, both the articles of Bernard Oladosu Omisore, Augustina Nwaneka Nweke and Fred C. Lunenburg have suggested the use of new approaches for addressing the ever changing organizational challenges in the busses world. As mentioned by Fred C. Lunenburg the new approach of employee empowerment has become useful in the modern organizational setup.

From the above-discussions, the following recommendations can be made:

Avoid aggressive use of power – The employees of the organizations must try to avoid any kind of aggressive use of power. The aggressive use of power creates mental pressure on the other employees and breaks the team bonding within the organization. Ultimately, the overall performance of the company is hampered.

Use power in a friendly way – The employees of the organizations must use the power in order to improve their personal performance as well as the overall performance standards of the organization. Therefore, if the employees use their power in a friendly manner then they can get help from the others and they can help others in their works. Hence, power can be used for personal improvements and organizational improvements.

Compare and Contrast with Previous Articles

Use power strictly to implement any essential policy – The management of the organizations can use its power to implement any new and essential policy. Sometimes, management faces several issues from the employees’ end while implementing any new policy. At this time, management can use its power to implement the policy successfully.

Use power to motivate the others – The people especially the leaders in the organizations can use their power to motivate the sub-ordinates. The leaders can positively influence the sub-ordinates or team members by using their personal as well as organizational power. For example, the leaders can provide the reward to the sub-ordinates, whose performance standard is at the highest position. This will motivate the employees or team members to perform better in the future days.

Therefore, from the above recommendations, it can be said that if the people in the organizations use the power in a right manner, then the performance of the organization can be improved easily.

In the analysis of the four articles, it has been identified that term power is very common for any type of organization. Power can bring positive outcomes as well as negative outcomes. In the article ‘Power and Leadership: An Influence Process’, it has been identified that there are mainly two types of power present in an organization and these are – organizational power and personal power. Personal power of the people in the organization comes from the job satisfaction, performance standards and the organizational commitments. On the other side, organizational power comes legitimate and rewards.

The impact of power on the performance of organization depends on the way how the people use it. Sometimes, the people use the power in such a way that abuses the other people. This kind of use of power hampers the organizational performance. The authoritative power forces the employees within the organization to execute their tasks or works. This type of force creates mental pressure on the employees. Hence, the performance standards of the employees get down, which affects the overall performance of the organization.

However, the articles have also indicated that the power that is generated through high standard of performance and job satisfaction is helpful for improving the performance level of the organization. This type of power of the employees helps the management to operate the business successfully. At the same time, the presence of this type of power helps to bring a positive working environment within the company. On the other side, positive power helps the employees to enhance their performance standard. Improved performance standard also helpful for the future carrier development of the employees as well as helps them to overcome any type of challenges at the workplace.

Therefore, it can be said from the key findings of the articles that power is good for future development of an organization; however, the impacts of power depends on its use.

References:

Anderson, C. &Brion, S. (2016). Perspectives on Power in Organizations – Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 1(1):67. Annualreviews.org. Retrieved 5 October 2016, from https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/full/10.1146/annurev-orgpsych-031413-091259

Lunenburg, F.C., 2012. Power and leadership: an influence process. International journal of management, business, and administration, 15(1), pp.1-9.

Nweke, A.N., 2014. The Influence of Power and Politics in Organizations (Part 1). International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 4(7), p.164.

Singh, A. (2016). Organizational Power in Perspective: Leadership and Management in Engineering: (ASCE). Leadership And Management In Engineering. Retrieved from https://ascelibrary.org/doi/10.1061/%28ASCE%29LM.1943-5630.0000018.