“Holier than thou” was the way my former boss described me to the company owner behind my back. When this comment finally made its way to my ear, I had no idea why she would say such a thing about me. In light of my recent promotion, my relationship with my boss seemed great. Unfortunately, the power of my new position had gone to my head and I was the last person in the office to notice. This event in my life can also be interpreted as Kipnis, Castel, Gergen, and Mauch’s (1976) Metamorphic Model of Power, which is otherwise known as the idea that having power changes people and many changes are undesirable such as my attitude in this situation.
Working as a designer of vinyl wall decals, inside of a small family-owned business was a dream. I was able to wear what I wanted and had positive relationships with my coworkers. We worked as a team, in a joint effort, in order to complete tasks effectively and in a timely manner. When my boss was offered a promotion, she came to me to offer me her position as the lead designer. This meant that I would be in charge of two junior designers and I graciously accepted her offer.
With this new position, I felt more confident than ever. I got such a sense of importance when I was asked questions. Little did I know, this was the first effect of power in Kipnis, Castell, Gergen, and Mauch’s (1976) Metamorphic Model of Power. Eventually, when I was asked what I perceived as a simple question with a widely-known answer, I became annoyed. I often offered a short response that was dripping with sarcasm. Some days I would notice that I had poor attitude, but most of the time I did not. This represented the second part of Kipnis, Castell, Gergen, and Mauch’s (1976) model as I was devaluing others. It later came to my attention that other people were noticing, too.
On top of forfeiting my positive working relationships, I was also not fitting my relationship role within the company, which affected the task roles of others. This made tasks difficult to finish and an overall inefficient company. As a solution, I apologized to my coworkers and thought more about my responses before I said them. This was not the easiest solution, because the power still tried to creep into my head, but eventually we were able to form a stable workplace again.
Kipnis, D., Castell, J., Gergen, M., & Mauch, D. (1976). Metamorphic effects of power. Journal of Applied Psychology, 61(2), 127-135.
This is very interesting and I think everyone can benefit from reading this. While it is very common to see power going to peoples heads per say, most people do not realize they are letting this happen to themselves. I know at my work I find many people that fall under this category and as easy as it is to talk bad about them I think it would be easier to just tell them the way they are acting.
One aspect of applied social psychology that I feel is seen in this would be the fundamental attribution error. While people might feel that you were just being plain rude when answering questions, you in fact did not mean to come across as such. While they might have been right in saying that you let you let your new position get to your head, they also do not know what else could have been going on to make you respond in such manor. I am sure that your new position came with more responsibilities and stress. Where you might have been acting in such behaviors to people because of you power you may have also been doing so because of stress from the job or being worn out from your new position. I feel that people, including myself, are easy to judge other people blaming them for their behaviors before thinking about other factors that could be involved.
I also feel that the metamorphic model of power was seen in here as you said. Power does change people in ways that they often do not realize they are changing and they often would not like the way they have changed. It is good that you admit your flaw and you see that you did change because it gives you the opportunity to reverse your change before its to late. I do feel that most people want power whether it be at work, in a relationship, or in a group. I am also guilty of wanting power at times. The problem with power is when people let power go to their head depending on what base of power they are at could have really catastrophic results. For example, the HR at my work has the power of firing people, as soon as she has a altercation with someone she tries to find reasons to fire them. She has literally fired people for things that other people have done and not be reprimanded for. And sadly enough, I do not think the need for power ever ends. Even when someone reaches one power they want a higher power rather than just being happy with where they are at.