The Sources and Use of Power in the Managerial Position in an Organization
Power refers to the ability to influence or manipulate an individual or a group. Power is used to give a sense of direction by compelling others to buy your ideas and directives. Leaders, managers, and bosses use the aspect of power to move their subordinates to the direction of their choice. There are a number of sources of power, ranging from legitimate power, expert power, coercive power, referent, reward and information power (Luthanset.a/,2015). The manager of a company which I worked for combined a number of these powers to undertake various managerial roles.
When joining the organization, the manager possessed expert power. He was formerly employed as a staff. He exhibited exemplary managerial knowledge and skills in his area of jurisdiction, which won him favor in the eyes of the CEO. Through impression management, he achieved upward influence that won him a promotion to be the department manager, and later the overall manager in charge of the company and its employees. Rational persuasion convinced the CEO that he was a potential manager. This was achieved through competence in work, meeting the targets and hard work that increased his performing even under minimal supervision. Effective and opportunistic use of the expert power granted him the legitimate power.
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As the manager, he was tasked with the role of leading other employees, I been among those working under him. He used this power to ensure that the company goals are met. A month after he was promoted to the company manager, he introduced the open communication channel, where the staff was free to view their ideas. He could draft the shortterm goals and use the principle ‘what can be done to achieve this’. The consultation approach influenced the staff to perform their best since they felt appreciated by the management reforms. With his legitimate power, he created workable goals, safe working environment and equated the staff with necessary resources and skills through training programs. The Ingratiation influencetactic was a motivational tool that boosted the company production by 10% in his first year of management.
Been the overall manager, he was in charge of employee remuneration. This was another mode of influence through the use of reward power (Yukl& Falbe, 1990). He determined the salaries, bonus, wages, and promotions. The manager reviewed the salaries to correspond to the company profits. By use of the exchange influence tactic, he won his way to effective employee motivation. The employee turnover declined with the reformed remuneration package. As a manager, he had information power. He combined this with the expert power to influence the employees through rational persuasion tactic. After establishing the goals and actual activities to be accomplished, he would justify the stances with factual data and logical arguments that gave every employee the reason to use the given approach. Every set goal and activity had a reason, and the power of reason persuaded the employees to exhibit exemplary performance (Luthanset.al, 2015).
According to my assessment, the manager made good use of the powers. He used expert power to gain other sources of powers, which he employed positively to meet the company goals. He did not use oppressive influential tactics such as legitimating and pressure tactics, which could otherwise call for resistance and minimal compliance. A good manager or leader can make a positive use of the sources of power through influence actives to manipulate and influence the target group with minimal resistance.
References
- Luthans, F., Luthans, B. C., & Luthans, K. W. (2015). Organizational Behavior: An evidencebased approach. 1AR
- Yukl, G., & Falbe, C. M. (1990). Influence tactics and objectives in upward, downward, and lateral influence attempts. Journal of applied psychology, 75(2), 132.
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