For my blog this week, I want to use the example of one of my former coworkers. We started out as peers, working together and collaborating on special projects and tasks. Over a period of time, he became a little more ambitious, looking for a promotion within the department. What he started doing was being an influence to others in the department, helping others to work more efficiently and also under his guidance. He used his own behaviors to change the actions, opinion and behaviors of others (Hughes, 1993, 123). This was great for the department, he was able to show our Vice President that he could lead others while still maintaining his workload and getting things done. He was eventually promoted to manager in the department. From that point, we all saw where he was drunk off of power. Power is the ability to produce effects on others, (p. 107) and he did this with much more force now that he had a new title. There were things that he asked us to do that were more like demands instead of questions. The difference was like night and day.
Hughes states that a leader but may ask a follower to complete a task, but if it gets done or not depends on the function of the leaders request (p. 109). Along with other outside factors such as tools and skill set, playing a part, how motivated a person is can also attribute to them completing the task. My coworker used power more than influence once he was promoted. he use the capacity to cause change with power instead of allowing his behavior to influence others to do what he desired. This was something that caused a conflict within the department. The employees were looking to him to be a leaders, they wanted to be able to go to him with questions and concerns. the thought was that he was going to be a “player-coach”, but what he ended up doing was changing who he was and what he was about because he got the title he wanted.
We had a team meeting where we expressed out concerns and we told him how we felt about what he was doing. After the meeting, he began to influence the others in the department in a different way, his influence turned to threats. He did this because he felt resistance from the team. This influential tactic is considered a hard tactic, and is used when leader have the upper hand. Instead of us sitting around and letting the environment turn more toxic than it already was, we went to the Vice President and stated our case and asked her if she could step in because he was now creating a hostile work environment. Through our actions as a group we were able to influence her to step and take action. While the whole time she thought he was doing a good job, we were able to step in and change her beliefs and behavior as a result of our influence tactics (p. 108).
In the end, the power obtained in that new position went to my former coworkers head. And once the Vice President stepped in and saw the how the department was being ran, she strongly suggested that my coworker look for another position outside of our department. Because he was such a good individual contributor, he was able to find a new position in no time. And once he was gone, things eventually go back to normal.
Seeing how power could change a person showed me that it is better be influential than to have power. You can influence other without leading them and still reach a goal, while you can have power and be in a position of leadership and not lead effectively. Having power and using it ineffectively can work against you and make you a bad leader. But having the ability to influence others can put you in a leadership role without a person even trying to be in one. While both power and influence are important parts of leadership, how they are used is more important in the big picture.
Reference
Hughes, R. et al. (1993). Power and Influence. Leadership: Enhancing the Lessons of Experience. Homewood, IL. Irwin. Ch. 5. pp. 107-131. Retrieved from https://reserve-libraries-psu-edu.ezaccess.libraries.psu.edu/psych/485/48501.pdf
mrb5628 says
Great blog, I appreciate how it started out by calling attention to the fact that people can be changed when obtaining power. I experienced this myself to a certain degree but due to different circumstances. I started out in my company as a temporary employee eventually worked my way up the corporate ladder to become a supervisor. This took roughly six years. During that time, I was never provided with any type of formal leadership training. Everything I had in my arsenal was learned by previous supervisors/managers that I had reported to. Truth be told, I didn’t apply for the position for any reason other than I wanted to make more money. Like the person you blogged about, I was ambitious for different reasons other than power. Two of composites identified by Miner (1974 as cited in PSU, WC, L.7, p.5) around motivation to manage stand out to me. First, I was very competitive. Whenever there were opportunities for recognition or advancement I would double down on my efforts. I was also very active within the organization by volunteering for community events and was assertive when making improvement recommendations. To state it simply, I wanted that manager position to advance my career.
In your blog, you mention that the new manager resorted to pressure tactics to influence the team after he was approached about his behavior. I am shamed to admit this, but I did the same thing when I first became a supervisor. However, it wasn’t intentional. I still had that competitive nature and now I was on a new stage. Instead of competing against co-workers, I was competing against other supervisors to have the best performing team. Going back to the path-goal theory (Halpin & Winer, 1957, as cited in Northouse, 2016), I took a directive behavior approach where I would tell employees what they should be doing (even though they already knew in most cases) and then use pressure tactics like threatening with corrective action if they did not improve. I now know that a supportive approach would have been much better since the phone work was very repetitive and the employees on the team had been there long enough to not need coaching. The bottom line is that I didn’t know about the different influence types like the ones identified by Yukl, Lepsinger, and Lucia on the Influence Behavior Questionnaire (1992, as cited in Hughes, Ginnett, & Curphy, 1993). For example, I could have used rational persuasion to show how slight changes in actions could cause an increase in overall performance. I could have used coalition tactics to have top performers do Q&A sessions to uncover common themes for success. I could have used exchange to increase numbers on particularly slow days by offering to buy lunch if the team hit a certain goal. Instead, I told people how they were performing, what they needed to improve, and then remind them that corrective action would occur if they didn’t improve. No wonder I wasn’t a popular supervisor at first.
You can only steer a boat into rocks so many times before you realize it will eventually sink if you don’t take another course. While the example you used decided to take another course and become an individual contributor, I feel using the lesson material, he would have been able improve his leadership by applying some of the things we learned in this course. First he could have been more aware of things that signify power. Some of the things I found that worked were dress up when issuing corrective action and dress down when building relationships with your followers. How you dress is a sign of power (PSU, WC, L.7, p.3). By dressing like your followers, you are signaling that you’re one of them. This is why things like baseball games or other activities outside of the office can be great team building experiences. I don’t even like baseball, but after a get together like that, the team always felt more united. Dressing more formal lends an air of authority to your demeanor. While not mentioned in our material, things like making eye contact and good posture is important when discussing corrective action as well since it shows that you are alert and increases your physical presence. Another thing I personally found helpful is visiting followers at their desks instead of always making them come back to yours. This puts them in their own territory (not as threatening) and also has an added benefit of showing the rest of the floor that you’re actively engaging with the team. It’s important to spread this out and not spend too much time at the same desk to avoid favoritism. These actions will help build referent power which is the “…strength of the relationship between the leader and the followers” (PSU, WC, L.7, p4).
Another way the manager in your blog could have improved would have been by using different influence tactics rather than just pressure. For example, Consultation would have been a great method for several reasons. First, asking agents to participate in the creation of something builds on their feelings of ownership. I have found that if employees help create something like training or coaching, they can become ambassadors of change. Second, consultation would help the leader transition from personalized power to socialized power because it would empower the group by allowing them to make decisions. The leader could have also incorporated several of Cialdini’s principles of social influence (2006 & 2008 as cited in PSU, WC, L.7, p.7). I found commitment to work very well when coaching employees. One of the things I would do was keep a running document on the employee. Every time we met, I would enter the date and bullet out the main discussion points. It helped me build relationships with my team because it served as a reminder for things the employee felt were important like a parent being sick, their dog’s name, or how many children they have. You would think that information should be easy for a leader to remember, but it gets tough when you have ~20 employees who don’t stay in positions for very long. One of the things I would also ask is what the employee planned to accomplish next week. This was a commitment from them and served as a starting point for our next conversation.
One line really stood out for me during our reading assignment wish was: “Leaders and followers typically use a variety of tactics to influence each other’s attitudes or behaviors” (Hughes, Ginnett, & Curphy, p.109, 1993). The manager in your example seemed to only take a single approach and did not allow his followers to influence him. This makes it clear why he was not a successful leader. Similar to your example, I initially only used pressure influence tactics when attempting to lead my team (which also turned out to be a failure). While I used trail and error to formulate my own leadership style, I think it’s safe to say that both of us would have benefited greatly from understanding power and how to influence followers.
Hughes, R. L., Ginnett, R. C. & Curphy, G. J. (1993). Leadership: Enhancing the Lessons of Experience. Irwin, Homewood, IL.
Pennsylvania State University World Campus (2020). PSYCH 281 Lesson 7: Power and Influence. Retrieved from https://psu.instructure.com/courses/2040131/modules/items/28001757
Northouse, P. G. (2016). Leadership: Theory and Practice. 7th Edition. Los Angeles, CA: Sage Publications.