Positional and Personal Power free essay sample

Drawing from positional sources of power is more effective in organizational settings than drawing from personal sources of power. Discuss. In this coursework I shall discuss two theories explaining different sources of power that related to positional sources of power and personal sources of power. I shall outline the usage of positional sources of power and personal sources of power , I also use sources to support or against statement. After that comparison will exist between positional sources of power and personal sources of power since by using some examples. Finally, I shall decide whether I agree or disagree this statement and comment on the influence of both sources of power in contemporary organizational systems and then conclude about the most effective way for manager. As a manager of the firm, power is a significant tool to influence employees. French and Ravens(1959,p434-435) shows that power can be divided by five sources that include legitimate power,reward power,coercive power,referent power and expertise power. We will write a custom essay sample on Positional and Personal Power or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Hales(2001,p435) develops further on French and Ravens theory claiming that coercive power, reward power,expertise power and referent power can involve both a personal and a positional source, except legitimate power which is only belonging to positional sources of power. It is manifest that positional power is depends on the role of the person in the organization whereas personal power is derived by the individuals personality, skills and capabilities. Now, it is turning to explain the usage of positional power and personal power by analysing the theory of French and Raven(1959,p434-435). Legitimate power appears to be derived from the formal position of a person in the organization which means the higher the position, the greater the power. For example, the boss has the power to decide to recruit or cut staffs, make capital expenditures and investment decisions. Actually, legitimate power is really useful. As Kanter(1979,p438-439) proposed that managers can enhance powers by assigning some of power to underlings. Since if the subordinates share the managers power, they would realize their responsibility and the sense of identity which is advantageous to enhance their confidence and finally maximize the potential of employees. Secondly, reward power is the capability of a manager has to reward employees if they follow the instruction. The rewards can include increasing salaries,promotions,bonuses and additional time off. It is evident that reward is the most practical way to motivate staff to complete the job. Therefore, having an efficient rewards system implies that a company has a hierarchical management structure. However, Simon(December 17,2007) argues that the manager should use the rewards system carefully. Simon explains that: One mistake that leaders often make is to assume that the reward is worth the effort in the eyes of their followers. Another possibility is that it could create or reinforce an entitlement culture where explicit rewards are the only motivation, and the revocation of the rewards creates the opposite outcome. It is also possible that followers who do not receive rewards can foster jealousy or resentment creating further problems within the organization. I support Simons argument. It is a normal phenomenon in a company that there are some staffs who are only motivated by rewards, they tend to focus solely on their own benefit. This will ultimately cause the CEO making the wrong decision and then stunts the development of the company. Using the reward system as a motivation also brings negative atmosphere around the office like entitlement culture which means employees t end to pursue rewards in excess by creating a cutthroat environment. However, if the management withdraws the rewards that may result in a general strike. Moreover, reward setting also may trigger the cut-throat competition among peers. In comparison with positional source of reward power, Hales(2001) provides the definition of personal source of reward power is credit for previous or future favour in daily exchange. For instance,one staff provides some financial support to another staff before he earns the important position in the organisation. When the former becomes superior to this another staff, it is assumed that he will be more faithful and work harder in order to requite the boss. This is the example of credit for previous. Another example of credit for future is the boss may promises a underlings like: If you finish this project well, I will pay you an impressive bonus. It tends to motivate this personnel to work harder than before. Thirdly, coercive power is earned from peoples formal position using punishment to force employees to reach the standard of the company which is opposite of reward power.. Coercive power is useful when the leader needs to plan a new regulation for organization or make a coincident decision in extraordinary emergency. However. Coercive power is unfavorably on the relationship between employer and employees. For instance, a personnel has to work excessive hours with no pay, but only to satisfy superiors. Although the boss may get a good result from subordinates, it also results in the abomination of workers. Another example is that the underlings have no courage to challenge against the wrong resolution of a arbitrary boss. Since they realize the boss would have a temper later. However, the personal sources of coercive power tends to be the good qualities of a person, like forcefulness, insistence and determination. (Hales,2011) To give an example of this, the leader tends to use the personal skills to find a lot of information to persuade underlings or the leader who has the strong determination to over come the trouble of the work. Obviously, employees tend to be overawed by the leaders strong personalities. After that, as Hales(2001) develops the French and Ravens theory, the referent power becomes the most striking change that he shows referent power also contains positional power. Steve Paton(p438) defines the referent power is where managers use their position to influence others by showing that what they propose is consistent with the accepted values and culture of the organisation. It is vital for leaders to build an unified culture and values for employees within an organization, especially for the company which recruit staffs from different countries and backgrounds. Referent power supports a leader to cooperate and communicate well with subordinates by orientating the same aim of the whole company. In contrast, Hales outlines the personal sources of referent power come from individual beliefs, ideas and characteristics. Hence, referent power also called charismatic power. There is a interesting example that BBC news( Why is Putin popular? Wednesday, 8 March, 2000, 13:17 GMT )indicates Vladimir Putin is Russias most popular politician. Unexpectedly, the reason is he looks young, energetic and clean. Obviously, his charisma attracts a lot of female electorates. In addition, in some companies, the boss tends to ask beautiful lady to be the manager of a department and dominants several males which is a way to use personal sources of referent power. Finally,expertise power is divided by two types that including administration expertise and technical expertise. Administration expertise means the chairman has the ability to create regulations and rules of an organization to preserve his entitlement. In another words, subordinates should follow the way that boss prefers. In contrast,technical expertise means the leader can look through the organizaition to earn more information, and then perceive the risk and opportunity of the company. Nevertheless, positional resource is only one part of expertise power. Personal resource is another part of expertise power which is the skills , knowledge and individual experience that leader have. If the leader just has positional resource of expertise power to dominant employees, the place of leader will be shaken. Simon mentions:Followers can have more knowledges, ability and skills than their leaders. New leaders particularly can possess far less knowledge than their followers. This can put you in a vulnerable position. It can be seen that although leader can use administration expertise power (positional power) to create rules to manage employees, the employees may not completely accept since they do not believe the ability, skills and experiences of their boss. (the leader does not have personal power) From above analysis, it can be seen that both positional power and personal power are useful within an organization. In order to compare their effectiveness. Dr. Dilip Abayasekara outlines a story which is Lets assume that Marilyn, a member of your team, is doing something that you disapprove. Youve observed this behavior before from Marilyn when others were in charge. Because others had the position of authority, you didnt say or do anything. But now you are the person who has the positional authority. Your perception of Marilyns motivation and behavior causes you to feel angry with Marilyn. You decide to put a stop to her actions, using your positional authority. You could do this in several ways. You choose to telephone Marilyns supervisor and tell him to tell Marilyn to cease that behavior forthwith. No explanations, no fact-finding, no listening. You just shut her down. End of story. That is an example of misusing positional power. From this story, it emerges the problems of using positional power. Actually, using positional power to stop the behaviour of Marilyn is not the end of the story. Marilyn will be disgusted with you since you even never listen to her explanation,even her supervisor will not agree with your behaviour and therefore he may dislike you as well. Moreover, Marilyn may pour out her complaints before her colleagues that also effect your reputation. The more employees misunderstand you, the more difficulties you will encounter in the future. In contrast, Dr. Dilip Abayasekara also assumes about how to use personal power to resolve this problem You are concerned with Marilyns behavior. You think you know what is motivating her actions. However, you dont want to shut her down in case you have misread the situation. So you call her supervisor, explain your concern, and ask him for an explanation. If the situation demands it, you meet with both the supervisor and Marilyn. Each person has an opportunity to communicate. Now you make a decision that takes the facts and feelings of the players into account but does not bend your principles or the policies of your organization. That is an example of using personal power. Distinctly,using personal power not only resolve the trouble, but also communicate well with subordinates. This way is much soft and peaceful that avoids the conflict between leader and employees. Therefore, according to this story, personal power is much effective than positional power. Furthermore, there is another study proving personal power is much more benefit for leader. Prof Nick Foster(2005) records a study that aims to research about which of the five power are the most effective in influencing other people? In 1984, the study of how 750 leaders used power to get along with their boss, underlinings and co-workers.? These leaders should order seven strategies from they typically use to they rarely use. The arrangement can be shown in the following: Using reason, data or logic (expert power) †¢ Friendliness and assertiveness (personal power) †¢ Forming coalitions with others (personal power) †¢ Bargaining and/or negotiation (expert and personal power) †¢ Ordering compliance (positional, reward and coercive power) †¢ Relying on the support of a higher authority (positional power) †¢ Sanctions or punishments (positional, reward and coercive power) Obviously, for the first strategy, it tends to detach the expert power and personal power. Nevertheless,using reason,data or logic is a skill of a person which means the expert power just has personal resource. Therefore, it can be seen from the list, top 4 sources of power are all about personal resources proves that personal sources of power is more effective in organizational settings than positional sources of power in this study. It is reasonable that leaders like to utilise personal power, for example, the boss who uses data, logic and information to support his decision has the strong persuasion which is much easier to earn the esteem from subordinates than using the positional sources of coercive power to force them pass your ideas. Moreover, most leaders also tend to be friendly with their staffs like listening and communicate rather than to use the legitimate power to threat underlings. The reason is using positional power is more likely to create a big gap between the boss and employees which results in the misunderstanding,antipathy and conflict whereas using personal power is more likely to sustain the boss form the coalitions with others that creates the powerful cohesion of an organisation. Nevertheless, is the positional power devoid of any merit? Apparently not. Dr. Dilip Abayasekara illustrates several occasions that positional power should be used:when you are chairing a meeting, ruling someone out of order at a meeting when that person is out of order; making decisions that you need to make because of your position, and not passing the buck; taking the initiative to consult with other leaders to fashion a compelling vision for your organization and its members and selling that vision with all your heart and soul. These are all wise uses of positional power. It can be concluded that leader should uses positional power at the formal event like meeting which shows the importance of the event. Otherwise, staffs will be lack of punctuality, even absent from meeting. Furthermore,the boss is also allowed to use positional power when the company at the emergency time, for instance, you consider a plan with careful consideration and you are one hundred percent sure it will bring the benefit to organisation but you have no time to e xplain the reason, therefore you could use positional power to pass the plan without voting. Dr. Dillip Abayasekara also mention about leaders may invest into a lot of time and ideas to innovate new policies and rules of the organisatation that more suit the settings, legitimate power ,rewards power and coercion power(positional resources) are more powerful and effective in this condition. In conclusion, from above analysis, I think there is no comparability between personal sources of power and positional sources of power. As Dr. Dillip Abayasekara points that The interesting thing here is that when personal power is used wisely, it increases your positional power. When positional power is used wisely, it increases your personal power. However, when either one of them is used improperly, it reduces both your personal authority and positional authority. For instance, Kanter(1979) illustrates that managers also could enhance their power gradually by sharing powers like positional power. He explains that : They can spend more time on external matters,making contacts, keeping in touch with what is happening, and so building their visibility and reputation. As a successful leader, he or she cannot be isolate which means they should invest time to expand the circle of acquaintances with senior people since the leader should absorb more experiences and widely information from wise people. In addition, an effective leader also needs to be an activist which means the leader not only understand the circumstance of his organistion, but also he needs time to observe the change of the external environment even whole world. It is the example of using positi onal power effectively that increases the personal power.