Organizational politics is viewed as a common approach to acquire power through dubious means other than virtue or merit. Organizational politics is a natural phenomenon resulting from the fact that people perceive things differently and act differently. This multifariousness creates a tension that must be resolved through political means. In some other sense, it could be argued that politics is used primarily to achieve power.
Power on the other hand refers to the possession of controlling influence usually used as a means to get things done. It is the basic energy to initiate and sustain action translating intention into reality; the quality with which leaders cannot lead…power is at once the most necessary and most distrusted element exigent to human progress.
Ideally, it is the ability to implement sustainable plans. In many occasions authorities use power when either there are conflicting points of view or when the decision to be undertaken is mutually dependent (Pfeffer, 1993). Interdependency entails a symbiosis relationship where both parties gain benefits from each other. Power and influence are applied when the individuals with whom there exists an interdependent relationship have a different point of view.
This happens especially in forums or groupings where a decision has to be made, and each party’s contribution is equally important, but at the end of the day a consensus has to be arrived at. Interdependence could results from the way in which tasks are organized in a firm. For instance, in a matrix structure, employees have to report to more than one manager.
If a motor vehicle manufacturing company such as General motors company decides to come up with a new hybrid vehicle model, it may result to deploy some of its engineers to the project , this decision is vital as it would affect the number of engineering personnel available to be dispatched to other fields.
The managers would therefore need to discuss and agree on the issue. Eventually this would necessitate those engineers assigned to the project , report to both the projects manager and also to their engineering departmental manager thus resulting to some level of interdependency between the two departments due to the sharing of resources. Likewise, the greater the degree of task specialization in the organization, the higher is the chance that disagreements will occur.
This is simply because, when work is divided into different specialties and units, it is more likely that the organization will have people whose differences in background and training will cause them to take different views of the situation. For a company dealing with production of consumer goods, the decision has to be made after consulting with all relevant authorities.
The research department has to carry out feasibility studies on the viability of the decision, the finance department will ascertain if the company is in a position to handle the expenditure; the marketing department has to come up with marketing strategies and so on. With such a large number of people involved it is scarcely surprising that differences of opinion will emerge.
The more important the decision, the more the people involved and for decisions of moderate significance, less people will be involved, thus the correlation between interdependency and the number of people involved is brought out clearly.
Techniques and Procedures That Can Be Used To Assess and Determine the Political or Powerful Units or People in an Organization
With regard to organizations, to evaluate power distribution in a firm, crucial sub divisions or subunits need to be identified. A unit usually refers to a department. These sub units should then be ranked based on their influence across the organization. Some subunits have a deeper relationship with resource flows thus better placed to minimize uncertainty levels in other subunits. Such subunits are more powerful in an entity (Pfeffer, 1993).
Changes in contingencies facing the organization often change with subunits having this power. Subdivisions can be drawn by function, geographical location showing where various offices and sub locations were located. Persons can thus be termed as powerful by virtue of educational background and training, the positions that they hold, their ability to influence others either through formal or informal organizations among others.
They may also be termed as powerful in reference to their political connections and social stature of their kindred. In this regards a company like Cadbury that is the leading producer of chocolate products, it would consider its production department in Cote de Ivoire as the most crucial to all its departments since its it largest provider of its vital raw material that is the cocoa beans, thus without the beans no business would be carried out even with all its heavy capital and equipments.
Sources that an Organization Unit or Person can use to Gain or Maintain Power in an Organization
From an organization’s point of view, power is a major motivational factor to individuals and many will go the extra mile to achieve it, and among the sources of power to be demystified hereunder is from formal authority or the formal organization’s position.
In this context, power will be mainly vested in the position of ‘departmental heads,’ where many will strive to reach. The power of a manager includes but not limited to making the organization’s major decisions based or guided by the firm’s mission, visions and strategies to be implemented (Pfeffer, 1993).
Therefore, when one is in such a position to handle such tasks he/she feels superior. A manager will also have several subordinates under him and more often he will exercise delegation of authority to them, and they will have to report to their superiors on a periodical basis, so that the manager can be at par with the current events that are taking place in the company.
The formal authority as depicted by an organizational structure entails that decisions, especially for a centralized organization are to be made by the management instead of the subordinates.
The power of some people will thus be curtailed while that of others will prevail in managing how decisions are made, for example by requiring consensus or senior – manager signoff, where in a project, the stakeholders will have some input through contributions but it is the management that will later meet to review them, evaluate the pros and cons and amend where necessary before administering the final decisions, a true manifestation of power as the figure – heads of the particular organization.
Since the manager is at the helm of the organization, it is thus general knowledge that he will be the head of the organization structure of the formal organization. This is set up by the purpose, mission, strategy and other objectives of the organization. The manager therefore is the flag bearer and it is his obligation to lead the subordinates into the effective realization of such.
A company’s success is credited to the top management while its poor performance is attributed to the same, therefore the management’s position is very important in the organization structure, and the manager will often use it to maintain his power (Pfeffer, 1993).
An example would be in regards to Virgin Atlantic airlines where by Steve Ridgway the current Chief executive officer would be highly regarded by the members of the public and also by his team of employees due to the position that he holds, access to crucial information and also his close relationship with Richard Branson the owner of the airline company.
The second source of power that one may tap into is the use of informal organizations. We have already seen how significant the formal organization is, however, some individuals will prefer a more indirect approach.
The use of informal organizations involve interpersonal alliances or networks, and for one to have influence on such he/she will have to be charming, willing and stubborn an example would be the executives of the shell corporation oil giant taking a day out to interact with its employees and customer at the gas stations and try to boost the morale of the staff at the same time take note of the problems that they may be facing first hand, that information of which may never reach their desk (Pfeffer, 1993).
These groups often induce a sense of certainty arising from what is commonly referred to as ‘group action’ in that individuals will feel protected and shielded by being in a group. An organization cannot exist without informal groupings, and in some sense they are like a stream flowing within the organization and controlling it is a major source of power and of maintaining the same.
Bibliography
Pfeffer, Jeffrey. Managing With Power; Politics and Influence in Organizations, MA; Boston, Harvard Business School Press, 1993. Print