13

POWER, AUTHORITY, INFLUENCE, AND POLITICS

What is Power?

Think of the term ‘power’ for a second and reflect on what goes on in your mind. Do you get a positive feeling? Well, if you don’t, you are not alone. A lot of people have negative feelings about power because the moment we hear that term, we quickly think of situations where we have been harmed by power – denial of leave or a well-deserved promotion or favouritism by a boss. We seldom connect the empathy, concern, and coaching we may have received from a boss to power. It is common and easy to think of leaders who have used power in an unethical way.¹ The negative connotation of power comples most leaders who have power to deny that they have it, and those who seek power pretend not to do so.² In reality, irrespective of the spheres in which leaders operate, they use power to achieve their goals. This is true whether it is Abraham Lincoln, Narendra Modi, Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam, Mother Theresa, Narayana Murthy of Infosys, or Jeff Bezos of Amazon.³ Hence, you should not shy away from the idea of power if you want to be a leader who wants to create an impact.

Definition of Power

The Business dictionary defines power as ‘ability to cause or prevent an action, make things happen; the discretion to act or not to act.’⁴ It can also be defined as ‘the capacity to influence the behaviour of others’.⁵ Yet, another definition of power is that power is ‘any force that results in behaviour that would not have occurred if the force had not been present.’⁶ One of the most accepted definitions of power in the organisational context is that ‘power is the ability to make somebody do something that otherwise he or she would not have done.’⁷

Dependency, a Key Concept in Understanding Power From the definition of power, it is clear that power implies making another person do something against his/her will. This is because the person acting against his/her will is dependent on the person who is exercising power. Hence, dependency is a key concept in understanding power. There are three types of dependencies:⁸

 

Power is the result of 3 dependencies:

Information dependency

Person dependency

Instrumentality dependency

 

1. Information Dependency: This is dependency related to knowledge about work procedures or processes. It may also be requirement of information about other people relevant to the work, norms, and networks existing in an organisation and interlinkages.
2. Person Dependency: This means our dependency on persons inside and outside the organisation. For example, you may be dependent on a chartered accountant for some work or your boss for some approval or you may be dependent on your subordinate for putting up a draft plan to you, with some data.
3. Instrumentalities Dependency: This refers to things such as equipment, machinery, computers, and computer programs/applications that we are dependent on. For instance, if you have a suitable computer program like SPSS, you have the power to analyse data and take decisions; else you will be powerless to analyse data.

Characteristics/Nature of Power (Also Referred to as Properties of Power)

Let us now discuss some of the important characteristics of power.⁹

• Relation: When we say power, there are at least two entities; one exercising the power and one subjugating to the power. The entities may be people, a department, a committee, or an organisation. Other entities or factors also influence this relationship. For example, a manager may want to exercise power over an employee, but it would depend on other factors such as the resistance of the employee, influence of a co-worker, or the union.
• Bases: Power always has bases. For example, a manager can reward/ promote or punish someone because rules exist to do so. Therefore, rules form the base of power.
• Means: Base becomes effective if the manager has some means to make the base operational. For example, a manager may have the power to reward/promote, but if there is no budget or vacancy, the power cannot be exercised because the means to exercise power does not exist.
• Scope: Scope refers to the relation between the entities involved. What if the employee is not bothered about a reward or punishment from the manager? In that case, the manager cannot have power over the employee and cannot create a change in the behaviour of the employee.
• Relativeness: Power is comparable and you can say that ‘X’ is more powerful than ‘Y’.
• Change: Whenever power is applied, there is a change in behaviour. In other words, change is a basic characteristic of power.
• Direction: Power has positive or negative direction. Let us consider a situation in which you failed to achieve your target. One manager punishes you by stopping your increment (negative direction) and another decides to coach you to make up the gap (positive direction).
• Contextual: Power depends on the situation. A manager can have power over you in the office, but would have no power outside the office.
• Dynamic/Shifting: Power is dynamic, and shifts as the society progresses.¹⁰ In many organisations especially those driven by knowledge, power has shifted from the employer to the employee. Power has also shifted from larger and structured companies to smaller ones who command high respect and valuation because of their niche in the knowledge economy. For instance, Dr. Lal’s Pathlab went for an initial public offering (IPO) of its stock valued at ₹10 for a price band of ₹540 to 550 and was oversubscribed on the second day. Many large companies do not have such a valuation. Power has also shifted from the government to the private sector in many ways. Governments all over the world are driven by WTO and other such bodies, where the private sector has a major say. Yet another prominent shift of power is from management to shareholders. This is partially because large institutional investors have a major say in an many companies. For instance, Canada Pension Fund invested ₹1000 crores in L&T Infrastructure on 15th December 2015, and hence, they enjoy power over the management.¹¹ Power has shifted from single entities to coalitions. Today, a coalition is more powerful than a single entity. This is because coalitions have the power to cover the weaknesses of its individual members. Another shift is from hierarchies and groups to networks. Networks (see chapter on Groups and Networks) tend to collaborate more. Therefore, they have the ability to command greater resources and knowledge, and become more powerful.

Sources (bases) of Power

French and Ravens Model

Earlier in this chapter, we discussed that at least two entities are involved in power; someone who exercises/wields power and someone who surrenders to power. Therefore, behaviours of both are important. Using this framework, French and Ravens, two eminent sociologists, identified five bases of power namely: reward power, coercive power, legitimate power, referent power, and expert power.¹² Because the classification is based on this dyadic relation (two entities), some textbooks tend to call it interpersonal category of power. Some others include coercive power, reward power, and legitimate power under formal power and expert power and referent power under personal power, respectively. In the opening case, at least three of these are evident – legitimate, coercive, and expert power. Can you identify these in the case?

 

Sources/bases/types of power as per French and Raven model are reward power, coercive power, legitimate power, referent power, and expert power

 

Reward Power The base of this is the ability of one to compensate/reward the other for the compliance. In organisations, managers exercise this power through methods such as performance evaluation, financial rewards, promotions, open appreciations, giving time off, allocating work with a friendly group, and giving meaningful jobs and job enrichment. For example, Ms Kalia referred to in our initiating case could permit Jerin to give discounts.

Coercive Power The root of this power is the ability of the person to punish for non-compliance. Hence, it is quite the opposite of reward power. Punishment may be a verbal warning, close supervision, unattractive assignments, stricter work rules or suspension, to name a few. Coercive power can also emanate from your superior strength (personal power) to bully someone and make the person do something that he/she would not otherwise do. Ms Kalia in our initiating case preventing Jerin from giving discounts is a case of using coercive power, and so is ragging in a college.

Legitimate Power Legitimate power comes from the belief that ‘A’ has a right over ‘B’ on some matters. Both ‘A’ and ‘B’ have to accept this. If they do not, legitimate power cannot operate. Organisations create legitimate power by having rules and regulations and creating statutes that govern the relationship between ‘A’ and ‘B’. Hence, we create positions in an organisation, and associate legitimate powers with each position that makes it possible to exercise this power. For example, Ms Kalia in our initiating case used her legitimate power to decline the permission to give discounts, and to terminate Jerin. Legitimate power can be exercised through social norms too. For instance, the head of a family has the legitimate power to demand a particular behaviour from others in the family.

Referent Power This power comes as a result of being admired, respected, or liked. The single most important indication is that ‘A’ wants to emulate ‘B’. A person with referent power may have personal charm and attraction, reputation, excellent character, charisma, moral dominance, and a variety of other attributes. Of these, moral dominance needs special mention. People with moral dominance create idealised influence over others. Often, those without position power are able to use moral dominance as a powerful source of power. Moral dominance is created through ethical practices, trust, walking the talk, adherence to values, and setting high moral standards. Gandhi and Mata Amritanadamayi are good examples of this. In fact, you can look around your office and find some people too. You would have seen this power in film stars, sports icons, some CEOs, most god men, and even in some teachers who have taught you.

Expert Power Have you ever gone to a friend to learn statistics? If so, why? Would you have gone to that person to learn business communication also? The answers to these questions sum up expert power. Expert power is an individual’s recognised specialised knowledge, talent, and abilities in a subject area, which other people are willing to accept and follow. People are willing to comply with a person with expertise in the area of that person’s expertise, but not in other areas. Expert power has little or no relationship to positions. A manager often obeys a subordinate when it comes to the area in which the subordinate has expertise. Expert power does not come on its own or merely because you are qualified. The expertise has to be repeatedly exhibited. For example, if you exhibit your expertise repeatedly in detecting bugs in a computer program, the manager and others will accept your expertise and be guided by you. It is common to see people thronging around others who have expertise in investment, computer applications, or writing a CV. Jerrin used both his referent and expert power in selling, to achieve exceptional results.

Other Bases of Power

• Structures In the organisational context, structures can be an important base of power. Corporate headquarters, a team, or standing committee can act as a base of power.
• Resources can be a base for power. For instance, a rich person can have power because of the money he/she has or a department with a larger budget may enjoy more power.
• Communication and Eloquence can lead to power. Mark Antony moving the crowd against Brutus using eloquence or a politician using language to persuade you are examples of this.
• Decision Making If you are part of a strategic group, then, because of the importance associated with strategic decision making, you gain power.
• Proximity Proximity to people in power can be a base for power. You might have observed how secretaries and even drivers of important people enjoy power.
• Technology and social media is a new phenomenon that forms an effective base of power. Using social media, you can appreciate or admonish and even gang up against someone. It also gives you referent power by projecting your persona.
• Teams and Groups are also base for power. For example, being part of an expert team gives you expert power, even though you may be only a group coordinator and may not have any real expertise.
• Coalitions and networks are also a base of power. For example, if an individual is part of an alumni network, a management network, or a goonda network, it helps the person to achieve legitimate power, referent power, or coercive power, as the case may be.
• Personal power refers to power that you acquire because of some personal attributes such as attractiveness, strength or might, moral dominance, knowledge, expertise, other personal characteristics, and personal networks that you have. In strict terms, personal power is referent power. It is important to note that personal power is something that others confer on a person who then exerts it. This is a tacit process. For example, moral power is conferred tacitly, and it is also taken away tacitly, when the moral standards fall.
• Love, as a Base of Power Does this surprise you? Kenneth Boulding identifies threat, exchange, and love as forms of power. Threat is similar to ‘power over’ or coercive power. Exchange is similar to ‘power with’. Power over and power with are discussed under types of power. However, love as a basis of power is different. It makes you do things for the sake of love. Often you agree to do some things only because the person whom you love asks or expects you to do it. Organisational loyalty, some aspects of employee engagement related to supervisor relationship, actions that emanate from super-ordinate goals such as supporting the cause of street children or teaching children under corporate social responsibility are found to have strong linkages with love.¹³

Types of Power

Let us now discuss different types of power.

Classification Based on Bases or Source of Power This is the most popular and well-established classification of power. According to this framework, the types of power are reward power, legitimate power, coercive power, referent power, and expert power. We have already discussed this under the head ‘French and Ravens Model’.

Classification based on Method of Generating Power Some authors consider that there are three types of power, based on how it is generated.¹⁴ These are:

 

Power can be classified as power over, power to, and power with

 

1. ‘Power over’ This is the ability to dominate someone and make the person do what one wants him/her to do. Usually ‘power over’ comes from force or threat. For example, the faculty has power over you to make you read a chapter. The faculty can do this by telling you that there will be a quiz in the next class.
2. ‘Power to’ refers to the ability to do something on our own. It refers to our intellect, resources, and knowledge to accomplish something. For instance, your expertise or creativity can make another person follow your suggestion.
3. ‘Power with’ refers to the ability to cooperate/collaborate with others and do something or deny something. This refers to the power of people who are working on a common problem. For instance, a member of a board of directors has ‘power with’ other members to take an action or deny something.

Other Classifications of Power There are many other ways you can classify power. Formal power is power you gain through a position or status. For example, a manager has position power, and an elected member of a decision-making body has status power. Delegated power is a form of formal power that someone has vested in another person. It can be taken away by the person who has vested it. An example of this is your manager delegating some financial powers to you. Power can also be classified as hard power, soft power, economic power, political power, and social power, just to name a few. Hard power refers to power by virtue of possessing something concrete such as muscle power, a strong military, or money, whereas soft power refers to power of convincing others, and having moral dominance.

Power Structure and Power Blocks

Power Structure

Cambridge dictionary defines power structure as the way in which power is organised and shared in an organisation or society. Domhoff and Dye defines power structure as “an overall system of influence relationship between any individual and every other individual in any selected group of people.”¹⁵

Power structure is often classified as rational power structure, democratic/autocratic power structure, and laissez-faire power structure¹⁶. Although this classification is more popular in politics and sociology, it has relevance in organisations also. Rational power structure means that power is distributed rationally in an organisation so that people can be held accountable. This leads to delegation and empowerment. With delegation and empowerment, job satisfaction and productivity increases. Hence, rational power structure impacts productivity/performance. Similarly, democratic/autocratic and laissez-faire structure also impacts productivity (refer discourse in the chapter on leadership).

Organisational structure lays down the formal power structure. Hence, by looking at the organisational chart, one can have an understanding of the power structure. However, this is often a simplistic view. If you look deeper, you will be able to find that policies, traditions, and conventions are also important to understand power structure. Policies may dictate that one manger has more power than the other, though both of them may appear at the same level in the organisation chart. Conventions may confer more power on one manager versus another located at the same level in the chart. For example, by convention, the operations manager may enjoy more power than a finance/HR manager in an organisation though they may be of the same level. The power of the strategic apex or the top management is usually governed by conventions than rules/policies. This is important to ensure that they have adequate flexibility to take decisions. To this, one must add referent and expert power which would change the power structure further. For example, an Assistant Manager with expertise in robotic manufacturing may have more power than even a manager who has expertise only in traditional method of manufacturing. Similarly, a charismatic manager and his/her team may enjoy more power than another manager and his/her team though both these may be at the same level in the chart.

Power Blocks/Coalitions

Power blocks can be defined as a group of people, networks, and/or organisations that come together to exercise power. Individually they would be weak and cannot exercise their power to further their interest. This is the reason why they create the blocks. The simplest example is opposition parties coming together to block the government actions and decisions. Similarly, a group of companies may come together to prevent a legislation that might harm them. Different unions often come together to counter the power of the management. Usually we think of power blocks in a negative sense and coalitions in a more positive way. Essentially both do the same – use the power of amalgamation to impose their will on another party. Power blocks can have a lot of positive impact on organisations. For example, a block can support change or divestment to save a company.

Model of Power

A self-explanatory model of power is given in Figure 13.1. The model proposes that there are various bases/sources of power. The power causes behaviour/response in others. This relationship is moderated by factors such as source appropriateness, amount of power, and other factors given in the diagram. Out of these, the power of the respondents is a crucial moderator and potential source of conflict. If you apply this model to the initiating case, you can see that the coercive, reward, and legitimate power of Kalia/Rahul came in conflict with the expert power of Jerin, and eventually led to conflict.

Now that we have understood the basics of power and how it works, let us have a look at the theories of power. Most theories of power have their origin in sociology. However, they find application in management also because power is essential to implement managerial decisions.

Dependence Theory of Power

Jerin depended on Rahul/Kalia to give discounts (initiating case). Rahul/Kalia also depended on Jerin to boost the sales for which they too were responsible. Employees depend on managers for leave, good performance evaluation, for job enrichment, continuation in the job, and for not being forced to do certain things. Managers also depend on employees to get quality work done in time. Therefore, there is mutual dependence. If you are not doing any unique job, a manager can replace you easily. This would increase your dependency on the manager; whereas, if you have unique skills that are difficult to replace, then, the dependency of your manager on you would be more. Dependency theory perceives power as a relationship between two entities. It postulates that the greater the dependence entity ‘A’ has on ‘B’, the greater would be the power that ‘B’ has on ‘A’.¹⁷

 

Power exists only because there is mutual dependence. Greater the dependence of A on B, greater the power of B has on A

 

Networks Theory of Power

In the chapter on groups and networks, we looked at the importance of networks in the modern organisations. Through networks, one is able to collaborate, and this gives both parties in question more power. For instance, the network of start-ups in Silicon Valley or Koramangala in Bangalore gives these start-ups more power because the network consisting of investors, legal experts, and consultants, all located in one place, help the start-ups. People at the core of the network have greater power than those who are on the periphery.¹⁸ For example, if you have an information network, the person who is the administrator has greater power than a person who is posting an input, because the administrator is at the centre of the network and can include/exclude the information you want to post. There are three important forms of power related to networks:

 

Networking power – enjoyed by everyone in a network

Network power – members of a network differ in the power they enjoy

Networking making power – power of the network members to expand the network

 

• Networking power refers to the power that all the members of the network enjoy in comparison to those who are not part of the network. For instance, if you are part of the mentoring network in your workplace, you would enjoy more power than those who are not part of it.
• Network power refers to the power of one individual in the network has versus another in the same network. For example, the person who decides who will be given access to the mentor network will enjoy more power than the one who has no such power.¹⁹
• Network making power refers to the ability of a network or people in the network in creating and expanding the network. For example, a mentoring network may be able to network with a network scouting for talent and find more suitable jobs for those in the network.²⁰

Three-Dimensional Approach of Power or Luke’s Three Faces of Power

Another way to look at power is through a three-dimensional approach namely overt, covert, and latent power.

• Overt Power: If your manager asks you to do a job that you do not like to do, you may still do it because she/he is the one who can reward or punish you. This is a simple case of overt power. This basic proposition was made by Dahl.²¹ Returning to our initiating case, Kalia had overt power over Jerin and Rahul.
• Covert Power: While Dahl highlighted the overt dimension, Bacharach highlighted the covert dimension. When a manager opts not to call a person who is relevant in the decision making for a meeting or excludes the person from the discussion and decision making, covert power is in use.²² By avoiding consultation with Jerin, Rahul and Kalia were exercising their covert power.

   

  Power can be overt, covert, or latent. Latent power is the result of influence

   

• Latent Power: A third dimension of power is that ‘B does things for A because A influences, determines, and shapes B’s will.’²³ For example, if a manager asks employees to upgrade their skills, the employees may do so. If the employees show reluctance to upgrade their skills, the manager may highlight the benefits of doing it and make the employees change their mind. In other words, the manager may shape the behaviour of the employees. This is possible because of latent power.

Three-Process Theory/Approach

The standard theories of power are based on ‘resources–power–influence’. ‘The Three-Process theory’ of power, on the other hand, is based on creating influence, influence leading to power, and power leading to control of resources.²⁴ For instance, Gandhi did not control any resources, but he created influence. The influence led to power, and power led to control of resources such as preventing use of imported clothes or non-cooperation. In the internet era, you would have heard about the use of social media to influence the thought of many people. It is then used to create power, say gather in one place, and then, the crowd power is used to control resources such as movement/action of an important person, allocation of land for a purpose, and so on. In the industrial context, it is common to see that unions first influence the minds of its members, which create power to control the resources such as allocation of wages or work.

 

Three-processes theory of power – influence, conversion of influence into power, and conversion of power into control of resources

 

Hickson’s Theory

This theory focuses on organisational power; particularly, how the subunit power works. The premise here is that organisation tends to reduce uncertainties for itself or its employees and therefore, a subunit that can do that better enjoys more power. It means that power depends on: one, ability of a subunit to cope with organisational uncertainties; two, whether a subunit can be substituted with another to cope with uncertainties, and three, centrality of the subunit in the workflow. For example, in an IT company that creates codes, the coders can reduce the uncertainty by producing quality codes in time. They cannot be substituted with any other subunit. Therefore, they are powerful. However, they depend on the business development subunit to get business, which is the first step. If business does not come, some of the coders will be benched or laid off. In a boom economy, work would flow without a problem and the pressure is on the coders, and therefore, they enjoy more power. However, in a downturn economy, orders would not flow and the business development managers have to get orders to reduce the uncertainty. Therefore, the business development subunit enjoys more power. Hickson’s Theory explains the relationship between organisational uncertainties, substitutability of the subunits to cope with uncertainties, and centrality of the subunit in the workflow.²⁵

 

Hickson’s theory proposes that ability to reduce uncertainties lead to power

 

So far, we looked at various concepts, theories, and bases of power. In this section, we will look at how power can be used in organisations.

Effect of Power on Organisational Factors

Power and Decision Making

A good framework to understand power and decision making is to look at the types of power (reward, coercive, legitimate, referent, and expert), the dependency theory, and Luke’s model. Legitimacy, reward, and coercions are the principal bases of power used by a decision maker. In an organisational context, managers would automatically have these bases of power. However, if the managers have expert and referent powers also, they would have added advantage in decision making. Hence, managers should always focus on updating their skills and expertise, so that, they increase their referent and expert powers.

Suppose a manager has legitimate, reward, and coercive power, but not expert or referent power, but an employee has these powers, then the power of a manager is likely to be reduced. In such cases, the manager should focus on collaborative decision making by encouraging the employee to contribute substantially to the organisation. Let us look at an example. A subordinate is a specialist in designing gears and the manager gives the person some goals related to design, to be completed in three months. The subordinate can easily say that it will take more time. Can the manager use her/his legitimate, reward, or coercion power to make the employee do the task in three months? The chances are not very high because the manager’s legitimate power is checkmated by the employee’s expert power. However, if the manager has good knowledge of designing gears, it is more difficult for an employee to say that it would need more time. From this example, it is evident that in today’s world of expertise, managers would have to depend on bases other than legitimate power, to get things done.

 

If managers allocate sufficient resources to employees, then it is easier to leverage their expert power

 

Managers make decisions on allocation of resources almost daily. Often, we find that managers tend to use their legitimate power to thwart the expert power of the employees by controlling resource allocation (revisit the initiating case). If the managers take decisions that allocate sufficient resources to employees, it is easier to leverage the expert power of the employees.

Power and Rule Making

In organisations, rules are made by different agencies – department heads, organisational heads, and so on. Rules may be related to use of resources, code of conduct, performance, rewards, and many such things. Legitimate power is the base for rule making. Reward and coercion powers are important because they give the rule a chance of being followed. Rules may not be effective unless the rewards for obeying them and punishments for disobeying them are included in the rule.

Power and Teams/groups

In a group/team, if the information possessed by the members is roughly equal, then, there will be balance of power. This will ensure better output in a group. Further, in a group/team context, expert/information power seems to have a greater impact than legitimate power.²⁶

 

Power manifests in language and vocabulary in a group/team

 

Groups and teams have more power because collectively they control more information and instrumentalities (machinery, software, and so on). It is common to see that the person who has a lot of information related to the task tends to be domineering in a group/team. When that happens, some others tend to resist it. If there is considerable domineering and resistance, cooperation decreases. Hence, we should ensure that no one enjoys disproportionate amount of power, so that there is more cooperation. Domineering can be reduced if the members empower themselves;²⁷ for example, by sharing the work nearly equally and by sharing the points of dominance like chairing a meeting on a rotation basis.

Power manifests in a group in different ways. Some examples are use of vocabulary and terms such as ‘elders’ and ‘new comers’ to refer to the older and newer members, practices such as small coalitions of select members in the group meeting prior to a formal meeting, storytelling about who used to take the lead and who tells how things used to be and should be done²⁸, use of metaphors such as ‘he is in command’, ‘three of us battled it out’, or ‘we battled it out’, rituals such as waiting for a key member to start a meeting or singling out someone for a reward, and use of objects such as slogans, T-shirts, and coffee mugs with the team logo/name.

Power and Networks

Networks are essentially about information and power. There are three basic types of networks: star, circle, and line (see Figure 13.2).

• In the Star, person ‘A’ at the centre has more power than any others as ‘A’ has access to all others; whereas all others have access only to ‘A’. Therefore, everyone is dependent on ‘A’. In many lobbying networks, this is a reality. The person who lobbies can be compared to ‘A’. Others in the lobbying network such as a businessmen, politicians, or socialites are dependent on ‘A’.
  

  Figure 13.2: Types of networks

• The second is the circle. Here, everyone has nearly equal power, as anyone can share information with anyone else, and no one can fully dominate anyone as in the case of a star.
• In the line, the power is relatively complex. While those at the edges are at a disadvantage, others have at least two alternatives, and hence, less dependence. It is complex because power of someone depends on who is on either side.

Understanding the power equation will help organisations to create networks within and outside the organisational framework with appropriate balance of power.

Power and Social Media

The power of social media to force political or even business decisions is on the increase. On January 17th, 2011, the loyalists of corrupt President Estrada of Philippines voted to set aside evidence against him. Opponents of this move used social media to gather people for a protest against this decision. The social media message said ‘‘Go 2 EDSA. Wear black’’ (EDSA refers to the cross roads in Manila). People began to move towards EDSA wearing black dress. In the next two days, the crowd swelled to a million plus. By 20th January, the corrupt President was gone. Estrada himself blamed the texting generation for his downfall.²⁹ The situation in Egypt in 2011 was no different. In India, the people’s movement against the rape of Nirbhaya in 2012 also used the power of social media.

Marketers are well-aware of the user-generated content and its power in marketing. It becomes possible for the public to get input on a product with all its features, prices, comments on experience of users and comparison with the competitor’s product. Open the site glassdoor.co.in and you can get the insider details of the companies, their practices, compensation, and much more. Thus, you can see that social media has created a new dimension of power.

On 15th August, 2013, an employee of Burger King in Japan posted a photograph on Instagram of him, lying on a pile of burger buns.³⁰ It went viral and created considerable ill-will against the company. Employees of Taco Bell and Domino’s Pizza handling food in a way that would put off many has also caused considerable embarrassment to these organisations. Today, employees are able to use the power of social media to coerce employers, generate opinion against their employers, and highlight unethical practices.

 

Social media can create coercive power, restrict illegitimate power, and create referent power

 

From the above mentioned cases, one can conclude that social media has emerged as a platform that can create coercive power, contain illegitimate power, and create referent power using user/people-generated information. From an organisational perspective, managers should learn to create policies for use of the social media in a positive way, manage the impact created by employees using social media to flex their muscles, and learn to leverage its power as a platform for referent power.

Application of Power in Organisations

Regulating of Power

In organisations, managers and leaders have a lot of power. They are well educated and have expert power. Their position gives them legitimate, reward, and coercive power. In other words, they enjoy at least four bases of power that make them very powerful. This also makes them susceptible to abuse of power. For example, although reward power is an excellent base of power, using it without ‘equity and fairness’ can demoralise employees. So is the case of coercive power that can have a positive as well as a negative impact. Hence, managers should be adept in utilising power. They can do this by:

• Introspection Introspection of use of power can be considered the most effective way of regulating power. It gives insight into the way a manager uses power and its impact on the organisation.
• Feedback The 360-degree feedback is an excellent mechanism to ensure that a manager gets some insight about the way she/he employs his/her bases of power. This should make the manager sensitive to use of power.

   

  To regulate power:

  Introspect

  Create feedback

  Delegate and empower

  Set clear standard

  Be transparent

  Establish grievance redressal

   

• Delegation and empowering Managers who effectively delegate power and empower their subordinates are able to regulate the use of power and make organisational functioning effective (Refer empowerment, involvement and delegation in chapter on fundamentals of OB ).
• Setting clear standards When standards set for reward and punishment are clear, the use of power gets regulated better.
• Transparency Transparency means making public the rationale for a decision. When this is done, managers tend to apply power more systematically and avoid its misuse. It is common to find that speaking orders and actions such as inclusion of rationale for reward, punishment, or termination from job, make the order/action more appealing to the employees, because it shows that power is not being misused.
• Grievances Redressal Often employees have complaints about the use of power by a manager. If the handling, processing, and disposal of grievances are separated from the ambit of the person against whom the grievance is initiated, abuse of power tends to get self-regulated.
• Ombudsman Appointment of an ombudsman to interfere in cases of excessive use of power helps in the regulation of power.

Effective Use of Power

The effectiveness of use of power can be perceived differently by the person using the power and the person facing the consequence of power (receiver). When a person perceives the use of power as negative, power may be interpreted as exploitation or manipulation. This is ineffective use of power. When the recipient gains something, such as economic resources, benefits of a changed behaviour or personal benefits, then, the use of power is effective. When an employee is absent frequently without reason and is punished, but feels that it is unjust and continues to come late, the use of power can be termed ineffective, although it may be just. At the same time, if the same employee accepts the punishment and modifies the behaviour of coming late, the use of power is effective.

 

In effective use of power, the receiver feels ego enhancement, support, or increased motivation.³¹ Some examples of how power is used effectively/ineffectively in organisations is given in Table 13.1.³²

It is an appropriate time to consider whether the CEO, Kalia, Rahul, and Jerin, referred to in the initiating case, used their power effectively.

Lower Functionary (Employee) Power

Within an organisation, power and positions are easily comparable. Those in higher positions have more power. Thus, a Vice President would have more power than a manager. Does a person in the lower hierarchy also exercise power; if so, how? This is what we shall see now.

• Access to Determinants of Power We have already seen that power is generated through information, persons, and instrumentalities. Access to these by the lower functionaries give them power. For example, if a sales executive has access to unique information about a customer or has access to the Vice President, Sales, he/she may enjoy more power than a sales manager.
• Expertise Those with greater expertise enjoy greater power, even though they may be lower functionaries. For example, in the initiating case, the CEO revoked the transfer of Jerin most probably because of Jerin’s expertise.
• Effort and Interest If lower-level employees are willing to take up responsibilities that higher level employees are reluctant to take up, the lower-level employees tend to enjoy more power. For instance, nurses dispense medicine and take decisions that make them powerful. Although the doctor can easily decline them the power to do so, if the doctor does so, s/he would have to invest time in doing it. This allows the nurse to enjoy more power, although she is a lower functionary.

   

  To gain power, lower functioning employees should:

  Access information, people, and resources that create power

  Gain expertise

  Show effort and interest Be attractive

  Use location and position Excel in communication Create coalitions

   

• Attractiveness Everything else being equal, a person who is viewed as more attractive is likely to gain access to powerful people more easily.
• Location and Position Physical location and closeness to instrumentalities (machines, software, and so on) act as a source of power for the lower functionaries. For example, a front-office executive may not be a high functionary, but the location and the ability to control access makes the person powerful.
• Communication A person who is central in processing communication is likely to enjoy power, even if the person is a lower functionary.
• Coalitions Lower functionaries, when in coalitions, often enjoy more power than senior functionaries, as is the case with unions.

Unequal Power in the Workplace

Unequal power in the workplace is a curse and leads to bullying, sexual harassment, variance in compensation, favouritism, and loss of morale and motivation. Hence, managers and leaders have to ensure that their organisations do not fall prey to it. We have already looked at several measures for effective use of power that would reduce unequal power in the workplace. In addition to these, the organisations should address the following issues:

• Equality of Pay Often, there is gender discrimination in compensation, although this may be at times related to the willingness of male employees to accept mobility and relocation unlike their female counterparts. However, as a policy, organisations should focus on compensation, based on job content and contribution towards organisational goals.
• Participative management There are different levels of participation commencing from suggestion to empowerment. Managers should adopt appropriate method of participation.
• Complaint Cells These are effective methods to ensure that some workmen are not left powerless. Response of the complaint cells should be speedy, and approach to handle complaints should be driven by empathy.
• Transparency Follow transparency in pay, promotions, rewards, and disciplinary actions.
• Vishaka Guidelines Ensure that organisations implement ‘vishakha’ guidelines for handling sexual harassment cases. There are several internet sites that highlight these guidelines given by the Supreme Court of India.
• Handling Workplace Bullying Workplace bullying can be subtle. For example, questioning without domain expertise, criticising a plan without data, showing lack of interest in someone’s presentation very explicitly or making snide remarks about someone are subtle, but serious, ways of workplace bullying. Managers often allow bullies to thrive by their silence because it takes too much of trouble to handle bullies. Managers often play the ‘rescuer’ role by supporting, empathising, and pacifying the victim. These are ineffective strategies to manage a bully. Bullying is best handled by accepting the problem, interacting directly with the bully and defining the expected behaviour, creating 360-degree performance evaluation, defining norms for meetings, circulating leadership roles, and seating plans in a meeting and disabling access of the bully to power.

Although power and authority are closely connected, often confused and used interchangeably, they are distinct concepts. Let us try to differentiate them.

Relation between Power and Authority

In 2014 and 2015, India witnessed a lot of situations where the Parliament was unable to pass bills although the ruling party had a substantial majority. We also have seen that in many cases, the Supreme Court of india passes orders, but it is not followed. For instance, the guidelines of Supreme Court on pollution or Vishakha guidelines related to sexual harassment are often ignored by people and organisations.

Now, let us consider a few work situations:

1. Situation 1 A supervisor finds an employee sleeping while the machine is churning out faulty products, but walks past as if nothing has happened because the employee is a local goonda. This is a case of authority without power.
2. Situation 2 Then, the supervisor finds another employee doing the same and gives him a slap. The employee immediately wakes up and starts working, despite knowing that the supervisor has no authority to slap. Later, he complains to the union that stirs up a ruckus and the supervisor is compelled to apologise. This is a case of having power without authority. It also shows that using power without authority can lead to problems.
3. Situation 3 In this case, the supervisor sees a similar situation and wakes up the employee, explains the dangers of his sleeping, issues a warning, and the employee attends to the machine diligently. Here, authority and power co-exist and complement each other.
4. Situation 4 Here, the supervisor wakes up the employee, explains the dangers of his sleeping, and issues a warning, but the employee goes to sleep again. Here, the authority is not fully accepted by the employee. As a result, there is no power to change the behaviour of the employee, although the authority itself is not questioned.
5. Situation 5 In a fifth situation, a respected colleague of the employee wakes him up and asks him to attend to work, and the person complies. Here, despite lack of formal authority, the employee accepts the power of the colleague.

From the above mentioned examples, we can say that power depends on the existence of a force and the ability of the agent (person exercising the power) to generate that force, while the authority depends on the ‘acceptance’ of that force by the target. For effectiveness, both power and authority should coexist. In the workplace, an employee who does not accept the authority of the manager may show less compliance, especially if the situation is not fully black and white.

Thus, we can say that:

• Authority is a vehicle or a means to legitimise the use of power^.33
• It is derived from the agent’s (say, manager) position in the organisation, knowledge, and expertise^.34
• Authority is ‘power granted for a purpose’; for instance, to issue a warning(but not slap) and to elicit the appropriate behaviour, although both are coercive power^.35
• Authority is derived from real or implied perception of the position of a leader.³⁶ If the target does not perceive authority in the agent, then, true authority will not exist.

Definition of Authority

Authority is defined as ‘institutionalised and legal power inherent in a job, function, or position that enables the job holder to successfully carry out his/her responsibilities. It refers to power that is delegated formally and legally. It includes right to command a situation, commit resources, give orders, and expect them to be obeyed. It is accompanied by responsibility for one’s action and failures to act.’³⁷ Additionally, true authority also means that the target accepts the authority.

Let us now look at another definition. Warren Bennis and others define authority as the ability to reward and punish, derived from the rights associated with a position to control the behaviour. In other words, power is the actual control, while authority is the legitimised control derived from rights associated with a position. From the situations discussed under ‘Relation between Power and Authority’, it is evident that in one case (situation 2), actual control was exercised through a slap (non-legitimised), but in another case (situation 3), control was exercised through a warning (legitimised). Although control was exercised in both cases, authority existed only in the latter case. It may be helpful to note that in sociological literature, the term ‘influence’ is used while referring to power and authority, whereas in management literature, the term ‘control’ is used to refer to power and authority.³⁸

 

Power is actual control, while authority is the legitimisation of power. Power can exist without authority

 

In sum, we can say that effective authority is legitimised use of power, wherein the target accepts that the agent can exercise such power.

Types/Sources of Authority

It is common to see that people classify authority in their own way and refer to legal authority, moral authority, religious authority, and the like. To understand the types of authority, let us fall back on the work of Weber who defined three types of authority:³⁹

• Rational-Legal Authority This refers to the authority that is derived from formal rules and laws. Usually, these are in written form, and often, they are complex as you would find in an act of the parliament or in the written statutes that an organisation makes. For example, Ms Kalia had rational legal authority to decline a discount or terminate Jerin.

   

  Authority can come from:

  Rational-legal authority

  Traditions

  Charisma

   

• Traditional Authority This type of authority is drawn from long established customs, habits, and social structures. For example, senior managers not having to follow the queue at the food counter or not having to wait in the queue to board an elevator may be an established custom that gives them the authority to jump the queue. Not questioning a manager may be a tradition in some society and this could give the manager authority. Characteristics such as familiarity, esteem, and habitualness also lead to traditional authority.⁴⁰ Modern organisations often tend to dismantle traditional authority, so as to bring greater equality in the workplace. This is the reason why in many IT companies, even the CEO follows a queue for food or for boarding an elevator.
• Charismatic Authority Here, the charisma derived from the moral high ground created by a leader gives the authority. Having moral high ground depends on several factors such as creating trust, walking the talk, being just, transparent, equitable, ethical, honest, and a plethora of other virtues. For example, Gandhi did not have a position, yet had tremendous power, and no one questioned his authority to call for a boycott of British goods. This emanated from charismatic authority. Abdul Kalam enjoyed authority even after his tenure as the President of India. Many entrepreneurs like Azim Premji of Wipro also enjoy charismatic authority.

Is it possible for a young manager to have charismatic authority? The answer is affirmative. In fact, to lead self-managed teams, some charismatic authority is essential.

Need for Charismatic Authority

Most modern organisations work on the basis of groups and teams. Many of them are cross-functional teams. In this case, the cross-functional team leader and the functional head, both would have legitimate authority over a member. For example, the Vice President, R&D would have legitimate authority over an engineer who is nominated as a member of the product development team. At the same time, the team leader of the product development team would also have legitimate authority over that engineer. This impacts the effectiveness of legitimacy. In such a case, the team leader of product development (cross-functional team) will have to depend more on charismatic authority than on rational–legal authority to elicit appropriate behaviour from a team member (the engineer in the example mentioned). In self-managed teams, members create their own legitimacy through collective acceptance of goals and means of achieving them. In such cases, the role of charismatic authority is even greater. Today, the impact of rational–legal and traditional authority has been severely undermined in high-performance work organisations and charismatic authority has been replacing it. Hence, as a manager and a leader, you should focus on cultivating charismatic authority rather than depend on rational–legal authority or traditional authority.

What is Influence?

Many of us have heard about Dale Carnegie and his book ‘How to win friends and influence people’. The sheer popularity of the book and the fact that his writings have outlived him for seven decades underscore how much people yearn to influence others. If you have ever gone to your mother and asked her to get you some money from your father or met a secretary to get some favour from the boss, you already know what influence is. Influence can be defined as the ability to change the actions of others in some intended fashion.⁴¹ Intuitively, we know that influence is about making someone do something that the person would not normally do. Power is also about that. This leads to considerable confusion between the terms power and influence. Let us therefore first differentiate between power and influence.

Differentiating between Power and Influence

Differentiating between power and influence might sound like hair splitting. This is because power leads to influence and influence leads to power, making it almost indistinguishable. For example, Gandhi had no power but influenced many people. However, since he influenced many people, he had the power to coerce the British government.

To differentiate, between power and influence, let us revisit the definitions. Power is defined as ‘any force that results in behaviour that would not have occured, if the force had not been present’⁴² and influence is ‘the ability to change the behaviour (to include opinions and attitudes) of others in some intended fashion’.⁴⁴ In both cases, a behaviour that one would not have been normally shown is the end result.

• First, influence is created because of the person who is influenced (the target) needs to be liked by the person who is influencing (the agent). If a child influences its parent to follow the ‘odd–even’ rule mentioned in Box 13.1, the target is the parent and child is the agent. This is not so in the case of power. For instance, a child influencing parents to buy it a chocolate, father giving you money on the request of your mother, or you, influencing your friend to quit smoking happen because the target (parents, father or the friend) needs to be liked. This is equally so, when the boss influences an employee or a team-mate influences another, to give their discretionary effort for success of a project.

   

  A can influence B, if B wants to be liked by A. B can influence A if A wants to enhance self-esteem by identifying with B or if A is not sure and wants to be right by following B

   

• Second, is the need to be respected or the need to increase one’s self esteem. You may change your attitude, opinion, or behaviour when a spiritual guru tells you to do so. In this case, the influence is created by your need for self-esteem by following the instructions of someone with moral dominance. You may also be influenced by your boss, and do an extra bit for success of a project because you want to increase your self-esteem.
• Third, is the need to be ‘right’. If you are influenced by a rule or a boss to be punctual, the underlying force would be the need to be right. In Section III, we discussed the case of people of Manila thronging the street to protest against the decision to absolve their corrupt president through the use of social media. When a social media message reaches you, you are not sure whether joining a protest is right or not. However, you feel that everyone is going to do that, and that it is the right thing to do. This feeling/perception influences you. This is one of the important reasons why people joined Gandhi in his Dandi March. Equally, this is also the reason why people disconnected with an agitation are often influenced to throw stones at buses when they see a few people doing it.

From the above mentioned examples, we can see that influence differs from power on three key aspects: the need of the target (and not the agent) to be liked, respected, and right. Hence, influence is more enduring than power.

Importance of Influence

Influence is important to create change, get assistance and cooperation, obtain resources, coordinate across teams and departments, and implement plans. In the OB context, influence has a special significance because influence means modifying behaviour on a more enduring basis.⁴⁵ Hence, it is at the heart of effective leadership⁴⁶ and change.⁴⁷

Types/Classification of Influence

There are different forms of influence, which we can classify based on our needs, the nature of influence, and forms of influence.

Based on needs Human beings have the need to accept evidence from others and the need to be liked. The former creates informational social influence and the latter leads to normative social influence.⁴⁸ Informational social influence is created because of the need for social proof. When we are told to do something by our boss or by a group of people (including social media), and do not have sufficient information on the subject, we nevertheless do it without any questioning. This influence is the result of our belief in others’ ability to interpret information; more so because we have no information at all. In other words, we use social proof to change our behaviour.⁴⁹ Normative social influence is the influence that leads us to conform, in order to be liked and accepted.⁵⁰ The power of this influence is drawn from the human need to be a social being, having companionship, and association.⁵¹

 

We are influenced because we like to accept evidence from others and be liked by others

 

Based on nature of influence Herbert Kelman identified three important types of influence based on the way people respond to influence. These are compliance, identification, and internalisation.⁵² People comply when they are influenced and do things against their own opinion. However, in this case, there may be no change in attitude, and hence, they may not be enduring. During the freedom struggle, Gandhi influenced many Indians to boycott cloth made in Britain. Gandhi was able to do so because the women (the target) wanted to be identified with Gandhi. The US embassy that was exempted from ‘odd–even rule’(Box 13.1) for use of vehicles in Delhi voluntarily followed the rule. This is because the purpose of the rule, that is, reducing pollution in Delhi was internalised by the US embassy.

 

Influence leads to compliance, identification, and internalisation

 

Based on forms There are many forms of influence:

• Sales and Marketing form Before deciding to seek admission to a management institute, you would have taken a look at the ranking of the institute you plan to apply to, and this would have influenced your decision. What you would have done is an example of sales/marketing form of influence.
• Conformity form We discussed how the crowd got together in Manila to oppose the corrupt president. This is a case of influence leading to conformity.
• Socialisation form Have you ever heard of a story where the lovers agreed to separate because they were from different religions or castes or because the parents did not agree to the marriage? Social norms, customs, values, and ideologies are another form of influence.
• Peer Pressure form I am sure you would have gone for a movie just because your friend insisted, though you would have preferred to do something else. That is how peer pressure creates an influence on you.
• Obedience form Obedience is something that is scripted into us, so much so, even if we merely perceive authority, we tend to get influenced and change our opinions and actions without bothering to check on the authority. See Milgram’s experiment in the chapter on fundamentals of behaviour.
• Leadership This is of course one of the most powerfuls forms of influence because people follow leaders, and do not hesitate to do things that are completely new.

Creating Influence in the Workplace

Managers have power and they can make the employees do what they want in most cases; but what about the employees? Can they also get the managers and co-workers to act as they desire? The answer is affirmative. Employees can get managers and co-workers to change their opinion, attitude, and behaviour through influence, though it may not be possible to do that through power. This makes influence universal because it is a force that one can use irrespective of the position power one wields. Anyone can have influence, provided the person is willing to create it for herself/himself. Influence has a lot to do with personal attributes; so much so, some scholars tend to call it personal power. The key attributes of an employee who creates influence are: ⁵³

1. Trustworthiness Trust is a valuable and a foundational attribute in the workplace. There are many ways an employee can gain trust of the superiors. One of the most effective ways to gain trust is to present one’s arguments based on facts, and in the larger interest than in personal interest.
2. Reliability When co-workers believe that they can rely on you, you earn their respect, and in turn, you are able to influence them. Meeting commitments, informing when there would be a delay in delivering as per schedule, not holding back information, following through on agreements, showing resilience (spring back) when there is a setback and willingness to give a helping hand when required are some of the manifestation of reliability.

    

   An employee can influence by:

   Being trustworthy

   Being reliable

   Being assertive

   Careful targeting

   Enhancing interpersonal relations

   Adhering to ethics

    

3. Assertiveness Assertive people stand up for their views, give suggestions, and make requests in the open, give honest viewpoints, and regularly engage with other people. It is not aggressive behaviour, but ability to project the needs of the individuals and organisation clearly and concisely.
4. Careful Targeting involves a clear idea about the target you intend to influence. When an employee targets to influence a manager and achieves it, their overall influence also grows.
5. Interpersonal Relations to include attractiveness and empathy also help to create influence. Refer chapter on interpersonal relations also.
6. Adherence to ethical practices It is important to ensure that your actions are ethical. If not, you will fritter away all your efforts to achieve influence.

Cialdini’s Six Principles of Influence

Cialdini spelt out six principles of influence in his noted book ‘Influence: Psychology of Persuasion’. These are reciprocation, social proof, commitment with consistency, liking, authority, and scarcity.⁵⁴ These are discussed in detail in the Value-Added Knowledge, at the end of the chapter.

 

Cialdini’s six principles of influence are reciprocation, social proof, consistent commitment, liking, authority, and scarcity

 

Social Media and Influence⁵⁵

Social media can be put to use for creating influence. For example, your social media posts can project your expertise, act as a medium for others to seek advice and solve problems, and be a repository for organisation relevant knowledge and practices. It can muster support for a cause, highlight a wrong doing by someone, promote organisational and team values, project your attributes of trustworthiness and reliability to a wide audience, target multiple sources of power (managers from different areas within and outside the organisation), and be a focal point for discussing ethical issues.

Social media makes it possible to influence your network and other networks. It can muster social support on a wide variety of organisation-related issues, vent grievances; thus, it can become a medium to create expanding influence. It is the ability to influence other networks and go viral that distinguishes social media influence from other types of influences.

Leadership and Influence

In the organisational context, the difference between a leader and a manager is thin; so is the difference between power and influence. This is because all organisational leaders are managers with a position and have legitimate power, reward power, and coercive power. Leaders have personal power (expert and referent power) also. Since organisational leaders are usually well qualified and have required competencies, usually they have expert power. Therefore, leaders who create greater influence do so by using their referent power. Some of the important findings related to organisational leadership, power, and influence are:⁵⁶

• Personal power or influence has great impact on job satisfaction, organisational commitment, and performance of the followers.
• Legitimate power leads to influence through compliance, and hence, the influence is short lived. In this case, employees do not give their discretionary effort.

   

  Good leaders create influence through referent and expert powers

   

• The initial influence of reward power tends to wane soon, and employees feel manipulated and dissatisfied if reward power is not used appropriately.
• If coercive power is used to create influence, the result is frustration, fear, revenge, and alienation. Eventually, this leads to poor performance and turnover. Use of coercive power reduces the influence leaders can create through referent power and expert power.
• If expert power is used to create influence, attitudinal change takes place. Expert power also tends to create conformity.
• Referent power has considerable influence because it creates trust, compliance, loyalty, and commitment. This leads to reduced need for supervision.
• Idealised influence Defined by Bernard Bass as a component of transformational leadership, idealised influence is created from referent power and expert power. It is the result of moral ascendency or moral high ground created by the leader through setting examples, being ethical, walking the talk, and creating trust and respect (Refer to chapter on leadership for a detailed discourse on Idealised Influence).

Influence in Virtual Organisations/Networks

Virtual organisations are organisations that operate largely using information and communication technologies (ICT). In such organisations, opinions and criticisms are shared openly. This characteristic has an impact on how influence works in virtual organisations. First, influence of legitimate power is negligible in virtual organisations. Reward and coercive powers exist with the ‘collectives’. In other words, likes, appreciations, and dislikes are used to reward or coerce a person. This takes place in the space created by the members of the group or the collectives. Hence, influence lies in the collectives, rather than in an individual. Expert power has considerable influence on virtual organisations, but such influence is possible only if the information is shared and that too if it is done freely. As a result of this, experts can influence only by sharing, volunteering, and collaborating (e.g., Wikipedia creates influence through sharing expertise and knowledge). Since people are not in physical contact in virtual space, influence through referent power (respect and trust) is created largely through greater voluntary actions and collaborations in sharing information in the virtual space. From this, it is evident that expert power and referent power are more important in virtual organisations than in traditional ones.⁵⁷

 

Virtual organisations run on referent power and expert power

 

Meaning and Definition of Politics

We have had a good look at power, authority, influence, and their importance. In organisations, appointment of people in various positions is decided by the higher management. Such appointment gives the position holder legitimate power. However, other sources of power, such as expert and referent power, come from acceptance of the person by peers and subordinates. Hence, we can say that power is vested in an individual based on the formal authority of the position given to the person as well as the person’s expertise, personal power, and competencies. Attractiveness of personality is an added dimension.⁵⁸

Organisations do not have sufficient positions and resources to fulfil the power needs of everyone. Hence, employees and managers adopt various methods to gain more power for themselves at the cost of others.⁵⁹ This is what we call politics. Politics is not always dysfunctional. For instance, if the Vice-President of Product development uses ingratiation as a tool to garner more funds to launch more innovative products, it is surely politics; but it cannot be considered dysfunctional or an action for personal gain. Keeping these aspects in mind, organisational politics can be defined as the effort of one party to gain power and influence over another, disproportionate to what is mandated by formal power structure by garnering resources or control; whether such efforts are for individual gain, benefit of a group, or for organisational development. A quick analysis of the initiating case would bring out how Kalia tried to gain power and influence over Jerin and how Jerin also did so by giving discounts without bothering to persuade Kalia to approve the discounts.

Two Sides of Organisational Politics

Is organisational politics good or bad for the organisational growth? There is a split verdict on this. There are two types of organisational politics; namely, positive and negative(Table 13.2).⁶⁰

• Negative Impact of Organisational Politics First, let us look at the negative impacts. There is evidence that organisational politics lead to increased job anxiety,⁶¹ reduced job satisfaction,⁶² disillusionment with the supervisor,⁶³ increased internal turnover,⁶⁴ and decreased commitment and involvement.⁶⁵ Negative politics is often unethical and leads to conflicts. Usually, the negative side is highlighted and involves illegitimate behaviour. Kalia’s method of handling the case of Jerin is an example of the negative impact of politics.
• Positive Impact of Organisational Politics Whistle blowing, Young Turk game to put the right person in position, obstructing dysfunctional change, and using politics to garner larger budget to achieve goals are politics with positive outcomes.⁶⁶ Career advancement, recognition and status, enhanced power and position, attainment of personal and organisational goals and successful accomplishment of job or policy implementation, feeling of ego and achievement, control and success are all related to the ability to show appropriate political behaviour.⁶⁷ There is also a relationship between successful managers and frequent use of organisational politics.⁶⁸ For example, Jerrin’s walking to the CEO and getting the transfer cancelled is a case of politics helping the individual and the organisation.

In sum, organisational politics cannot be written off as dysfunctional. A lot lies in the eye of the beholder. Hence, we often hear the term ‘perceived organisational politics’. This term is used because what one perceives as negative, another may percive as positive.

Causes (Factors Affecting) of Organisational Politics

There are numerous causes for political behaviour. Karren Cocciattolo makes an excellent summarisation of these.⁶⁹ Guclu Atinc has also done an excellent meta-analytical study of the factors affecting organisational politics using 24 variables that affect political behaviour.⁷⁰ Let us now combine these studies and look at the causes of politics in three categories – person-related causes, job and work-related causes, and organisational-related causes.

 

Causes of politics can be person- related, job/work- related, or organisation- related

 

Person-Related Causes

• Genetic Darwin’s theory highlights the role of competitiveness for survival. As a result, human beings are coded for competition. This genetic attribute manifests in organisational politicking, although all political behaviours are not caused by genes.⁷¹
• Predisposition Humans have a predisposition for striving for power. This can be seen from pre-historic days. Modern organisations accentuate this when they create specialisations and departments that lead to disparity in power. This, in turn, triggers political behaviour.⁷²
• Narcissism Narcissism is at least partially responsible for the first stage of human development (refer chapter on fundamentals of behaviour). This makes political behaviour natural to humans.⁷³

   

  Person-related causes of politics:

  Genetics

  Predisposition

  Narcissism

  Perception of being manipulated

  Personal traits

   

• Perception of being manipulated When employees perceive that they are being manipulated, they tend to engage in political behaviour. Actions of unions, department heads, and individuals show this trend.⁷⁴
• Personal Traits and Demographic Variables Machiavellianism and external locus on control are linked to political behaviour. Demographic variables such as age, gender, education, and minority status do not show much relationship to perception of organisational politics.⁷⁵

Job/Work-related Factors

Job-related variables that affect political behaviour are:⁷⁶

 

Job/work-related causes of politics:

Autonomy

Feedbacks

Skill variety

Cooperation

Opportunity for advancement

Expectations met

Opportunities for career development

Trust

Leader-member interaction and exchange

Participation

 

• Autonomy in the job The greater the autonomy in a job, the lesser the need and tendency for political behaviour. In the initiating case, Jerin did not enjoy autonomy for giving discounts, and this prepared the ground for indulging in political behaviour.
• Feedback Feedback tends to reduce political behaviour as one knows clearly where one stands. Further, if the organisation has a system of 360-degree feedback, people tend to reduce political behaviour as it might lead to adverse feedbacks from peers.
• Skill variety, Cooperation, Opportunity for Advancement, Expectations met, and Opportunities for Career Development When the job has these key components, employees feel better empowered, and they tend to show less political behaviour.
• Trust, Leader-member interaction and Exchange These reduce the anxiety and fear of losing influence and power, which lead to less politicking.
• Participative Decision Making It is a method of devolving power in a transparent way. Because of this devolution, disparity comes down and so, political behaviour diminishes.

Organisation-related Factors

 

Organisation-related causes of politics:

Change

Clarity of objectives

Uncertainties

Resource limitation

Competition

Integrity

Transparency

Equality

Structure

Responsibility disagreement

 

• Change, and Clarity of Objectives, When objectives are unclear, resource are limited and a lot of unplanned decisions have to be taken due to changes, the environment becomes susceptible to politicking.⁷⁷ Increased political behaviour, in turn, creates more ambiguity.⁷⁸
• Uncertainties Uncertainties about various strategies, their relative priority, uncertainty with the promotion policy of the organisation, not having clear performance parameters for promotion and vague policies and procedures for promotion are some of the reasons that lead to politicking. Disrespecting others and thwarting formal procedures are the methods used for politicking in such situations.⁷⁹ Uncertainties in decision making and lack of standards, processes, and procedures are other important causes of political behaviour.⁸⁰
• Limitation of Resources and Internal Competition When an organisation is confronted with acute competition and limited resources, employees tend to indulge in political behaviour.
• Lack of Integrity, Transparency, and Equality This is one of the main reasons for perception of politics in organisations. When decision making is transparent and some minimum standards in integrity and equality are maintained, political behaviour can be minimised.⁸¹
• External Competition Global competition, technological changes, and need to produce more for less, lead to political behaviour as everyone would be trying to garner the scarce resources. Political behaviour in organisations in low-resources countries also tend to be higher.⁸²
• Structural Often, structures of an organisation lead to conflicts and politics. This happens when tasks are not well-coordinated. For example, if a product development is to be done, the development team has to draw talented people from different departments. The department that sheds the talent tends to lose on productivity. Hence, they may resist sending their best people for this crucial job. In order to avoid sending the best talent, they often adopt political behaviour. The team itself may get mired in politics because of a lax structure.⁸³
• Responsibility Disagreement Politicking happens when there is disagreement on responsibilities. In a complex situation such as rapid product development or solving a critical problem, global marketing and in self-managed teams, it is difficult to specify responsibilities, with precision. This is another reason for power struggles and politicking.⁸⁴

Political Behaviour/Tatics

Individual

There are hundreds of ways in which political behaviour manifests. Some of the more common ones are given in Table 13.3:⁸⁵

People adept in organisational politics tend to be articulate, sensitive, socially adept, competent, and popular. They are usually extroverted and show high degree of self-confidence, and are often aggressive and ambitious. They tend to be devious, highly intelligent, and logical, and would be perceived as ‘Organisation Man’.⁸⁶

Group Level

There are two types of political behaviour people indulge in: resist authority, which is something that unions often do and increase control over the subordinates, which is what managers often do. The former is called insurgency games and latetr is counterinsurgency games. For example, strikes by workers is insurgency game and lockout by employers is counterinsurgency games.

 

Power games are usually played to increase the power of an individual. Mintzberg, a noted management guru, identifies six types of games that people play in organisations, namely:⁸⁷

1. Sponsorship games means that a person gets close to someone with power and uses this proximity to gain resources or control, in return for loyalty.
2. Alliance games means peers supporting each other to climb the power ladder. For example, line managers may support each other against some staff proposals or they may support another line manager of their choice for promotion.

    

   Group level political behaviour:

   Sponsorship games

   Alliance games

   Empire building games

   Budgeting game

   Expertise games

   Lording games

    

3. Empire building games involves taking on more and more responsibility, thus increasing one’s sphere of power and influence.
4. Budgeting game is about cornering more resources for oneself or one’s department.
5. Expertise games are usually played by specialists who keep vital information to themselves, and make others dependent on them.
6. Lording games is the nomenclature for the tactics used by those in power to exercise illegitimate power over those without power. For instance, one can send a subordinate on posting to a difficult station, deny leave at the appropriate time or give a low-rating performance evaluation. This is the game Kalia played with Jerin (initiating case).

Other games that people play in order to gain political advantage are:

• The rivalry game which means ignoring the expertise of a person or unit in order to make the entity less powerful as is the case of rivalry between line and the staff or a manager ignoring the expertise of another.
• Change game in which people may become whistle blowers. Whistle blowing means reporting or making public the unethical practices by an organisation or a manager. Often, lower-level employees do this. They also tend to seek extra-organisational support for it.
• Young Turks game in which people try to change a person holding a position of power.
• Strategic candidate game is played in order to put a person of one’s choice in a position of power by campaigning and lobbying for that person.
• Obstructionism such as go slow or tools down are common political behaviour used to prevent a change or oppose the top management policies.

Managing and Leveraging Organisational Politics

Political behaviour can benefit an organisation if it is well managed:

• Attacking and blaming This behaviour can actually help one to prevent brushing the dirt under the carpet. When attacking and blaming happens, critically look at the reasons for it, see the missing links, and rectify the problems. Lack of group cohesion, not establishing goal(s) that cannot be measured and lack of a mechanism to fix responsibility, and share the reward are often the underlying reasons for this behaviour.
• Using information as a political tool Identify the impact of the information being withheld and create an alternative channel. This will not only enable in bypassing the person blocking the information, but also enhance the quality of the information as the alternative channel will increase the depth of the information, and make it more verifiable.
• Impression management Impression management or overselling oneself by making tall claims on one’s achievement is often considered political behaviour. However, this behaviour gives excellent opportunity to test the true competency of an individual. Had the person been quiet, we may miss to benefit from the competencies of the person.
• Coalitions Employees or managers often create coalition as a part of politicking. When this happens, rather than get upset, look at the opportunities in it. If you can identify the coalition and influence one or two of its members, the entire coalition can be won over.
• Ingratiation and Reciprocity These are excellent tools available for creating competitive advantage. Let us say that manager ‘A’ ingratiates the union leaders and gains concessions from them or ingratiates the boss and gains concessions for his subordinates. Although it can be called a political behaviour, such a manager is likely to be trusted and respected more by the top management, unions/the subordinates. This would give the manager higher authority that can be used for organisational benefits.
• Alliance Games Let us say the line managers play the alliance game and promote a pro-change line manager even though she/he is second or third in the reckoning. This will lead to change in the organisation. This situation is preferable to having a non-political environment in which a less competent manager gets promoted based on seniority or other factors.
• Budget Games Many detest the budgeting game, but if the budgets are closely linked to productivity or return on investment, then, lobbying for a higher budget by a department head itself can be beneficial to the organisation.

From the above mentioned discussion, it would be evident that though we may have a negative feeling about political behaviour, a deeper look reveals several benefits of political behaviour.

Summary

In this chapter, we looked at power, authority, influence, and politics. These are integrated concepts that help us to manage organisations better. Power along with authority, influence, and politics are essential to create change in organisations, and hence, these are important concepts in OB.

Power can be defined as the ability to make somebody do something that they would not do otherwise. Power is the result of dependencies. There can be information dependency, people dependency, and instrumentality dependency. In other words, if A depends on B for information, B has power over A. Similarly, if A depends on B to get some work done, then A can be said to have people dependency on B. Instrumentality dependency happens when we have to depend on some resources such as computers or software. Power keeps shifting. Because of knowledge economy, power has shifted from owners to managers and to employees with knowledge.

There are five important bases of power. These are legitimate power, reward power, coercive power, expert power, and referent power. Legitimate power comes by virtue of one’s position in an organisation. Reward and coercive power also comes with position. However, you may have reward power because you have money and resources, although not a position. You may be able to have coercive power because you are a bully, even if you do not have a position. Other bases of power are organisational structures, resources, communication and eloquence, decision making, proximity to a powerful person, technology, and social media. ‘Power over’, ‘power to’, and ‘power with’ are three important ideas in power. ‘Power over’ refers to the power that one can exercise over others, ‘power to’ refers to our power to do something, and ‘power with’ refers to our ability to collaborate with others and achieve something.

There are several theories of power. Dependency theory postulates that power is a relationship between two entities. Network theory explains that power is something that you gain because you are part of a network and can make others in the network or others in the related network do something, which they would not normally do. Luke’s Three Faces of Power explains power as overt power, covert power, and latent power. The Three-Process theory of power explains power in terms of creating influence, influence creating power, and power leading to control of resources which in turn can create more power. Finally, Hickson’s theory explains that ability to cope with organisational uncertainties creates power.

Power has an impact on decision making, rulemaking, and team building. Networks and social media are important resources to generate power. Managers should utilise power diligently. Unequal power can cause several problems in an organisation and managers should guard against this. Equality of pay, participative management, complaint cells, transparency, following Vishaka guidelines, and handling workplace bullying are well-established methods to ensure unequal distribution of power.

Authority and power are related but different. Authority can be defined as institutionalised and legal power linked to a position. Authority is a means to legitimise use of power and is derived not only from the position of a person in the organisation but also from knowledge and expertise. Authority is granted for a purpose. Real authority of a manager depends on how the others perceive the authority. For instance, if a manager fines a person for misbehaviour and that person refuses to pay the fine or continues to indulge in the misbehaviour, then, we can say that the manger has little authority. There are three important types of authority: rational legal, traditional, and charismatic. Rational legal authority comes from the position one holds. Traditional authority comes from traditions; for instance, authority of a father/a religious teacher. Charismatic authority come from the moral high ground a person creates for oneself. For instance, Gandhi enjoyed charismatic authority.

Influence is another concept related to power. Both power and influence make a person or a team do things that they would not do normally. However, power is created by dependency of one person on another. However, influence is created by one person wanting to be liked and respected by the other person. It is also created by our want to be right and our need for self-esteem. Trustworthiness, reliability, assertiveness, interpersonal relations, and adherence to ethical practices are important factors that help create influence. Cialdini lays down six principles to create influence. These are reciprocation, social proof, commitment, liking, authority, and scarcity.

Power and politics coexist. Politics can be defined as the effort of one party to gain power and influence over another, disproportionate to what is mandated by formal power structure by garnering resources or gaining more control. This may be for individual gain, benefit of a group, or for organisational development. Although the term politics is usually perceived with a negative connotation, politics can benefit an organisation in many ways. The causes of politics can be related to the person, work, or the organisation. For example, genetic disposition and narcissism are person specific causes. Lack of autonomy which leads to politics is a work-related cause and change/lack of clarity of objectives are organisation-related causes. People play games such as sponsorship games, alliance games, empire building games, budgeting games, expertise games, and lording games for politicking.

Power, authority, influence, and politicking are essential to create appropriate behaviour. Organisations tend to gain or suffer from the effect of these. Hence, managers should understand the impact of these factors and develop competencies to handle these factors that have a profound impact on OB.

Test Your Understanding

1. Choose the most appropriate answer from the following options:

   Which of the following is NOT one of the bases of power described by French and Raven?

   1. Legitimate power
   2. Autocratic power
   3. Referent power
   4. Reward power
2. Fill in the blank.

   The key concept in understanding power is_________

3. Choose the most appropriate answer from the following options:

   The term network power refers to:

   1. The power the member of a network has, which another network member does not have.
   2. The power that one member has in relation to another member of the same network.
   3. It refers to the power to make networks.
   4. The term refers to those at the boundary of a network capable of linking with others easily.
4. Choose the most appropriate answer from the following options:

   Employee ‘A’ was advised by the manger to take up a training program and upgrade his skills so that his promotion is not held up. The employee, who has never accepted to attend a training program before, accepted to do it. In the Luke’s Three-Faces theory of power, this would have happened because of:

   1. Overt power
   2. Covert power
   3. Tacit power
   4. Latent power
5. Choose the most appropriate answer from the following options:

   Shyam, Ram, and Saji are part of a star, circle, and line network, respectively. The person who has the potential to enjoy equal power with others in the network is:

   1. Shyam
   2. Ram
   3. Saji
   4. All of them have equal potential.
6. Choose the most appropriate answer from the following options:

   Gopinath is an account assistant and Sajitha is a front-office assistant. They both have the same rank and pay. In this context:

   1. Both Gopinath and Sajitha are likely to enjoy equal power.
   2. Gopinath is likely to enjoy more power.
   3. Sajitha is likely to enjoy more power.
   4. Being lower functionaries, neither enjoys power.
7. Choose the most appropriate answer from the following options:

   Which of the following is the most appropriate statement?

   A supervisor finds an employee sleeping while the machine is churning out faulty products, but walks past as if nothing has happened because the employee was a local goonda.

   1. This is a case of authority without power.
   2. This is a case of power without authority.
   3. This is a case of casualness of the supervisor, rather than an issue of power and authority.
   4. This is an issue of organisation culture.
8. Choose the most appropriate answer from the following options:

   Gandhi told the ladies of India to stop using imported silk so that the British Empire will not be able to get money and will have to quit India. Many Indian ladies obliged. This is a case of:

   1. Rational legal authority, as it gave the rational link between silk and end of the Raj.
   2. Traditional authority drawn from the supremacy of man in India.
   3. Charismatic authority.
   4. None of these
9. Choose the most appropriate answer from the following options:

   Mr Rajesh lives in Delhi. One day in December 2015, his child came home and said that the Chief Minister had come to her school and she has taken a pledge that she would ensure that her father will follow the odd–even rule (driving odd numbered cars on odd days and even numbered cars on even days). Mr. Rajesh agrees to it. This can be explained using:

   1. Social proof
   2. Normative social influence
   3. Living up to the promise made by a child.
   4. Compliance with a child’s request.
10. Fill in the blank.

    Influence in a virtual organisation is largely due to________ and _________ power.

11. Choose the most appropriate answer from the following options:

    The force behind influence resides in:

    1. The agent of the person who is trying to create the influence.
    2. The target that is influenced.
    3. The degree of power enjoyed by the agent.
    4. The dependence the target has on the agent.
12. Choose the most appropriate answer from the following options:

    Young Rony kept asking his mother to buy him another packet of chocolates. Rony’s mother declines as he had been having chocolates all day. Then, Rony tells her that she is a no-good mum and she relented. Rony was able to persuade his mother because of:

    1. Rony’s coercive power.
    2. Mother’s need for self-esteem.
    3. Mother’s need to be liked.
    4. Mother’s need to avoid the harassment.
13. Choose the most appropriate answer from the following options:

    Ranjit and his friend were going for a movie. On the way, they saw some people arguing and abusing a person. From the abuses, Ranjit and his friend could figure out that probably the person had misbehaved with a lady. Both of them did not hesitate for a moment to join the crowd and threaten the man. This behaviour can be best explained by:

    1. Conformism.
    2. Social proof.
    3. Outrage.
    4. None of these
14. Fill in the blank.

    Politics is the result of __________ of power.

15. Choose the most appropriate answer from the following options:

    Ms Lintel, the VP, HR did not like Ms Rathore who was Manager, HR. Ms Lintel always felt threatened by the intelligence of Ms Rathore. Therefore, she posted Ms Rathore from Bangalore to Delhi just after the spouse of Ms Rathore had managed a posting from Kolkata to Bangalore. This is a case of politics using:

    1. Lording game.
    2. Revenge game.
    3. Sponsorship game.
    4. Empire building game.

 

Need some help with this? Go to Answers to Test Your Understanding given at the end of the book.

 

Assimilation Questions

1. Rajan, a student of an MBA program in a well-reputed business school, came late for class by one minute. His professor told him he would have to submit a four-page handwritten essay on inflation if he was to be marked present. Explain this, using the concept of power.
2. Explain the idea of power shift using the bases of power with an example.
3. Explain dependency theory of power with an example.
4. Future IT Ltd. is a well-known IT company. It works on the basis of teams and groups. Teams are named after flowers, rivers, and so on. Team Sunflower is known for its timely delivery, high morale, and willingness to undertake jobs with a lot of ambiguity in the goals. Do you think Team Sunflower will enjoy more power? If so, why?
5. Discuss how we can use various bases of power effectively.
6. Differentiate between ‘power over’, ‘power with’, and ‘power to’.
7. Authority is derived from real or implied perception of the position. Do you agree with this statement? Justify with an example.
8. How can a manager use power and authority in a modern organisation?
9. Critically evaluate the statement ‘organisational politics is better dead than alive’.
10. Mr Sengupta is a young MBA graduate who just joined his dream company. After joining, he heard that everyone in the organisations plays politics. What tactics and behaviours should he adopt to play politics effectively?
11. People tend to play different games in organisational politics. Explain how alliance games and empire building games differ.
12. Critically evaluate different types of influence using examples to justify your answer.
13. Explain how social media creates influence using some of the attributes that creates influence.
14. You are a young MBA graduate with three years of work experience. You have just joined a company and taken over the reins of a team. How do you propose to go about influencing your team?
15. Explain Cialdini’s six principles of Influence with examples of how you can use them in life.

 

Need some help with this? Go to Clues to Answer Assimilation Questions given at the end of the book.

 

Application Challenges

1. Observe 10 to 15 members of your faculty and management for about a month. Identify the bases of power they use. Make a small critique on how they can use various bases of power better. Discuss your observations with one of them.
2. You are secretary of your business plan competition group and want to have a national event with mega prizes. You want to connect to the local management association, some angel investors, and prominent business men to support your project. Do a research and create an influence map. You might like to go through www.policy-powertools.org/Tools/Understanding/docs/stakeholder_influence_mapping_tool_english.pdf or similar sites.

Approach to Teaching/Learning

For Lecture-driven Teaching Those institutions which use lecture method can follow the standard pattern of lecture and quizzes. Thereafter, they can go to the experiential learning mode by attempting the application challenges.

For Case-driven Teaching Institutions that follow case method (participant-centred learning) may use the case mentioned below. To enhance the experiential learning, they can attempt one or both the application challenges.

Title of the case: ‘Navigating Organisational Politics: The case of Kristen Peters (A) and (B)’

Originator of the case: Columbia Case Works

Case No: ID# CU30

Source/available through: Harvard Business Publishing

Brief description: The case pertains to a management intern trying to create influence and would gel with the MBA students.