Whereas INFLUENCE DEPENDS on the SKILL of the influencer in affecting another person at a particular place or time, POWER is a CONSISTENT FORCE that is likely to work across situations and time. In organizations, POWER is a fairly STABLE capacity or potential that can consistently affect the behavior of others, as long as the power remains with the individual (Hocker & Wilmot, 1985). In other words, the use of influence strategies to affect the behavior of others is sometimes successful, but the use of POWER is ALMOST ALWAYS SUCCESSFUL.
(POWER SOURCES): power comes from the organization. ORGANIZATIONAL POWER comes from an INDIVIDUAL'S POSITION in the organization and from the control over important organizational resources conveyed by that position. INDIVIDUAL POWER is derived from PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS, such as particular expertise or leadership ability, that are of value to the organization and its members. Astley and Sachdeva (1984) outlined THREE
important SOURCES of ORGANIZATIONAL POWER. One is the HIERARCHICAL STRUCTURE of the organization. Organizational power can also RESULT from CONTROL of IMPORTANT RESOURCES such as money, fringe benefits, knowledge, and work-related expertise. Finally, ORGANIZATIONAL POWER can come from being in a POSITION of NETWORK CENTRALITY that is CRUCIAL to the FLOW of INFORMATION. bases, which are the sources of a person's power over others in the organization. They specified FIVE important POWER BASES:
coercive power, reward power, legitimate power, expert power, and referent power.
(POWER BASE 1) COERCIVE POWER: is the ability to punish or to threaten to punish other
(2) REWARD power: is the opposite of coercive power, for although coercive power is the ability to do harm, reward power is the ability to give something positive, such as money, praise, promotions, and interesting or challenging work assignments. The ability to reward others is a very common source of power in work organizations, where it often derives from having control over the resources that others value. Having the ability to administer pay raises, bonuses, promotions, or coveted work tasks can be an extremely strong power base.
(3) LEGITIMATE power: involves the formal rights or authority that an individual possesses by virtue of a position in an organization. Titles such as manager, shift supervisor, director, or vice president are all bases for legitimate power.
(4) REWARD POWER: is the opposite of coercive power, for although coercive power is the ability to do harm, reward power is the ability to give something positive, such as money, praise, promotions, and interesting or challenging work assignments. The ability to reward others is a very common source of power in work organizations, where it often derives from having control over the resources that others value.
(5) LEGITIMATE POWER: involves the FORMAL RIGHTS or AUTHORITY that an individual possesses by virtue of a position in an organization. Titles such as manager, shift supervisor, director, or vice president are all bases for legitimate power. When employees carry out a request simply because "the boss" asked them to do it, they are responding to such power. In work organizations, legitimate power is typically combined with the reward and coercive power bases. That is, most persons with legitimate authority also have the power to reward or punish subordinates. These three power bases are usually, although not always, tied together.
(5) EXPERT POWER: is one of the STRONGEST POWER BASES an INDIVIDUAL can possess because it results from the possession of some special, work-related knowledge, skill, or expertise. In high-tech organizations, or companies that are based on knowledge and ideas, such as software development, the development of complex drugs and medical devices, and the like, knowledge and expertise are valuable commodities. Research has shown that the possession of work-related expertise was found to be strongly related to supervisors awarding subordinates pay raises (Bartol & Martin, 1990). Expert power is also the source of power behind many health-care professionals.
(6) REFERENT POWER: develops because an individual is RESPECTED, ADMIRED, and LIKED by others. Because the person is liked or admired, workers respond to the person's wishes in an effort to please
Because of the renewed interest in studying organizational power, researchers have developed a number of scales to measure the different FRENCH and RAVEN power bases.
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