CHAPTER 8

POWER AND POLITICS IN AN ORGANIZATION

8.1 Definition of Power
If you were to think about the most effective managers you have known, chances are good that
you'd recognize that they were all pretty good at one important thing—getting others to do as
they wished. That is, they have power over others—the capacity to influence others in some
desired fashion.
In OB, power is defined as the ability to get someone to do something you want done or the
ability to make things happen in the way you want them to. So power refers to a capacity that A
has to influence the behaviour of B, so that B acts in accordance with A‘s wishes. This definition
implies that there is a potential for power if someone is dependent on another. But one can have
power and not impose it. Probably the most important aspect of power is that it is a function of
dependency. The more that B depends on A, the more power A has in the relationship.
Dependence, in turn, is based on the alternatives that B perceives and the importance that B
places on the alternative(s) that A controls. A person can have power over you only if he or she
controls something you desire. If you are attending college or university on funds totally
provided by your parents, you probably recognize the power that your parents hold over you.
You are dependent on them for financial support. But once you are out of school, have a job, and
are making a good income, your parents‘power is reduced significantly. Who among us, though,
has not known or heard of the rich relative who is able to control a large number of family
members merely through the implicit or explicit threat of writing them out of the will?

8.2 Contrasting leadership and power

For many, a leader is an individual—often with a title reflecting a high rank in an organization
(e.g., president, director, etc.)—who is influential in getting others to behave as required by the
organization. Indeed, social scientists think of leaders as people who have a great deal of
influence over others. Formally, we define leadership as the process by which an individual
influences others in ways that help attain group or organizational goals. The essence of power is
control over the behavior of others. Power is the force you use to make things happen in an
intended way, whereas influence is what you have when you exercise power, and it is expressed
by others’ behavioral response to your exercise of power.

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A careful comparison of our description of power with our description of leadership reveals that
the concepts are closely intertwined. Leaders use power as means of attaining group goal.
Leaders achieve goals and power as a means of facilitating their achievements.
What differences are there between the two terms? One difference relates to goal compatibility.
Power does not require goal compatibility, merely dependence. Leadership on the other hand,
requires some congruence between the goals of the leader and those being pursued. A second
difference relates to the direction of influence. Leadership focuses on the downward influence on
one‘s followers. It minimizes the importance of lateral and upward influence patters. Power does
not. Still another difference deals with research emphasis leadership research for the most part,
emphasizes style. It seeks answers to questions such as. How supportive should a leader be?
How much decision making should be shared with followers? In contrast the research on power
has tended to encompass broader area and to focus on tactics for gaining compliance. It has gone
beyond the individual as the exerciser of power because power can be used by groups as well as
by individuals to control other individuals or groups.
8.3 Base and sources of power
Managers derive power from both organizational and individual sources. These sources are
called position power and personal power, respectively.
1. Position Power
A great deal of the power that people have in organizations comes from the posts they hold in
those organizations. In other words, they are able to influence others because of the formal
power associated with their jobs. This is known as position power. Three bases of power are
available to a manager solely as a result of his or her position in the organization: reward,
coercive, legitimate and information power.
Reward power is the extent to which a manager can use extrinsic and intrinsic rewards to
control other people. Examples of such rewards include money, promotions, compliments, or
enriched jobs. Although all managers have some access to rewards, success in accessing and
utilizing rewards to achieve influence varies according to the skills of the manager. Power can
also be founded on punishment instead of reward. For example, a manager may threaten to
withhold a pay raise, or to transfer, demote, or even recommend the firing of a subordinate who
does not act as desired. Such coercive power is the extent to which a manager can deny desired
rewards or administer punishments to control other people. The availability of coercive power
also varies from one organization and manager to another. The presence of unions and
organizational policies on employee treatment can weaken this power base considerably.
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The third base of “position” power is legitimate power, or formal authority. The power that
someone has because others recognize and accept his or her authority is known as legitimate
power. It stems from the extent to which a manager can use subordinates’ internalized values or
beliefs that the “boss” has a “right of command” to control their behavior. For example, the boss
may have the formal authority to approve or deny such employee requests as job transfers,
equipment purchases, personal time off, or overtime work. Legitimate power represents a special
kind of power a manager has because subordinates believe it is legitimate for a person occupying
the managerial position to have the right to command. If this legitimacy is lost, authority will not
be accepted by subordinates. Legitimate power applies only to the range of behaviors that are
recognized and accepted as appropriate by the parties and institutions involved.
One of the most important aspects of legitimacy is the access to and control of information.
Information Power which is the fourth source of power available to people by virtue of their
positions is based on the data and other knowledge at their disposal. This is known as
information power.
Traditionally, people in top positions have available to them unique sources of information that
are not available to others (e.g., knowledge of company performance, market trends, and so on).
As they say, "knowledge is power," and such information greatly contributes to the power of
people in many jobs.
Although information power still exists, it is becoming a less potent source of power in many of
today's organizations. The reason is that technology has made it possible for more information to
be available to more people than ever before. As a result, information is generally no longer the
unique property of a few individuals holding special positions. Extending this thought, however,
when you consider the unique skills of those individuals who develop new technology, it is easy
to understand why they are often so very powerful members of today's organizations.
2. Personal Power
Thus far, we've discussed power based on an individual's position in an organization. Although
this is an important source of power, it is not the only one. People also derive power from their
own unique qualities or characteristics. This is known as personal power. There are four sources
of personal power: rational persuasion, expert power, referent power, and charisma. Personal
power resides in the individual and is independent of that individual’s position. It is important in
many well-managed firms. Three bases of personal power are expertise, rational persuasion, and
reference.

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Expert power is the ability to control another person’s behavior through the possession of
knowledge, experience, or judgment that the other person does not have but needs. A subordinate
obeys a supervisor possessing expert power because the boss ordinarily knows more about what
is to be done or how it is to be done than does the subordinate. Expert power is relative, not
absolute.
Should a supervisor's expertise be doubted, however, any power he or she may have based on
that expertise is threatened. Insofar as no one is expected to be an expert on everything, this is
not necessarily problematic. The less-than-expert person (even the boss!) simply can admit his or
her shortcomings and seek guidance from others. Problems develop, however, if someone in a
formal position of power has not yet developed a level of expertise that is acknowledged and
respected by lower-ranking persons. Those who have not demonstrated their expertise clearly
lack this important source of personal power. However, people whose expertise is highly
regarded are among the most powerful people in organizations.
Rational persuasion is the ability to control another’s behavior because through the individual’s
efforts, the person accepts the desirability of an offered goal and a reasonable way of achieving
it. Much of what a supervisor does day to day involves rational persuasion up, down, and across
the organization. Rational persuasion involves both explaining the desirability of expected
outcomes and showing how specific actions will achieve these outcomes.
Suppose you are chair of the board of a large high-tech company. Based on your business savvy,
you don't like what you see when you look into the future. Some of your products are doing
okay, but others are faltering. Something has to be done. You see the need to invest in several
new products, which, although unproven, you believe hold the key to the company's success—
indeed, its survival. How do you go about convincing the company's other directors and its Chief
Operating Officer to move in the direction you favor? People facing such situations tend to rely
on rational persuasion – that is, using logical arguments and factual evidence to convince others
that a certain idea is acceptable.
As you might imagine, rational persuasion is highly effective when the parties involved are
intelligent enough to make their cases strongly and to comprehend them clearly. Given that it is
based on clear logic, good evidence, and the desire to help the company, rational persuasion is
likely to be highly effective. Not surprisingly, rational persuasion is widely used among top
executives all the time.

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Referent power: Individuals who are liked and respected can get others to go along with them
simply because of that fact alone—a type of influence known as referent power. It is the ability
to control another’s behavior because the person wants to identify with the power source. When
you go along with something your friends want to do (e.g., go to a certain movie that you might
not prefer to see) you are influenced by their referent power. This occurs in organizations all the
time. For example, senior managers who possess desirable qualities and good reputations may
have referent power over younger managers who identify with them and who wish to emulate
them. Because they like this individual, they may go along with his or her influence attempts.
In other example, a subordinate obeys the boss because he or she wants to behave, perceive, or
believe as the boss does. This obedience may occur, for example, because the subordinate likes
the boss personally and therefore tries to do things the way the boss wants them done. In a sense,
the subordinate attempts to avoid doing anything that would interfere with the pleasing boss–
subordinate relationship. A person’s referent power can be enhanced when the individual taps
into the moral order or show a clearer long-term path to a morally desirable end.
Charisma Finally, some people are liked so much by others that they are said to have the quality
of charisma—an engaging and magnetic personality. There's no ignoring the fact that some
people become highly influential because of their charismatic ways – that is, because of how
they inspire others to do things.
What makes such individuals so influential? Four major factors appear to be involved.
A. Highly charismatic people have definite visions of the future of their organizations and
how to bring them to reality. Mary Kay Ash, the founder of Mary Kay Cosmetics, for
example, is widely regarded to be such a visionary.
B. People with charisma tend to be excellent communicators. In fact, they tend to rely on
colorful language and exciting metaphors to excite the crowd.
C. Charismatic individuals inspire trust. Their integrity is never challenged, and is a source of
their strength. Former U.S. President John F. Kennedy has been so described by many
historians.
D. People with charisma make others feel good about themselves. They are receptive to
others' feelings and acknowledge them readily. "Congratulations on a job well done" is a
phrase that may flow freely from a charismatic individual.

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8.4 Power in Group Coalitions
When people get together in groups, power will be exerted. People want to carve out niches from
which to exert influence, to earn rewards, and to advance their careers. When employees in
organizations convert their power into action, we describe them as engaged in politics. Those
with good political skills have the ability to use their bases of power effectively. Below we cover
the types of political activity people use to influence others as well as impression management.
There has been no shortage of definitions for organizational politics. One clever definition of
politics comes from Tom Jakobek, Toronto‘s former budget chief, who said, ―In politics, you
may have to go from A to C to D to E to F to G and then to B.
Organizational politics are activities that managers engage in to increase their power. Once they
acquire it, they can use power to influence decision making so that the organization pursues
goals that favor their individual, functional, and divisional interests. One reason why many
managers (and prospective managers) engage in organizational politics is that higher-paying jobs
are a scarce resource. The higher a manager rises in a hierarchy, the more difficult it is to
continue to rise because fewer and fewer jobs are available at the upper levels. To compete for
these scarce jobs and so increase their chances of promotion and receiving higher salaries and
benefits, employees try to increase their power and influence.
Without constant vigilance, however, organizational politics can get out of hand and prevent the
organization from achieving its goals. For this reason, top managers who understand how the
“game” of power and politics works must try to manage politics to promote its positive effects
and prevent its negative ones.
For our purposes, we will define political behaviour in organizations as those activities that are
outside one‘s formal role (i.e., not part of one‘s specific job duties), and that influence, or try to
influence, the distribution of advantages and disadvantages within the organization. This
definition encompasses key elements from what most people mean when they talk about
organizational politics. Political behaviour is outside one‘s specified job requirements. The
behaviour attempts to use one‘s bases of power. Our definition also encompasses efforts to
influence the goals, criteria, or processes used for decision making when we state that politics is
concerned with ―the distribution of advantages and disadvantages within the organization. Our
definition is broad enough to include such varied political behaviours as whistle-blowing,
spreading rumours, withholding key information from decision makers, leaking confidential
information about organizational activities to the media, exchanging favours with others in the

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organization for mutual benefit, and lobbying on behalf of or against a particular individual or
decision alternative.
Is the use of power and politics to promote personal or group interests over organizational
interests necessarily a bad thing? There are various answers to this question. On the one hand,
the terms power and politics often have negative connotations because they are associated with
attempts by one person to use organizational resources to further their own personal interests and
goals at the expense of other people. Managers who use (or, more correctly, abuse) power and
politics to promote their own interests are likely to harm the interests of others.
On the other hand, there are ways in which power and politics can help organizations.
First, when different managers or groups champion different solutions to a problem and use their
power to promote these solutions, the ensuing debates over the appropriate course of action can
help improve the quality of organizational decision making. In other words, political decision
making—decision making characterized by active disagreement over which organizational goals
to pursue and how to pursue them—can lead to a more effective use of organizational resources.
Second, different managerial perspectives can promote the change that allows an organization to
adapt to its changing environment. When coalitions, groups of managers who have similar
interests, lobby for an organization to pursue new strategies or change its structure, the use of
power can lead an organization to act in ways that improve its performance.

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