Ch. 13 Influence, Power, and Politics

Although many lower-level workers view politics as an additional burden, managers tend to view organizational politics as

"Part of the job".

What are the three important sources of organizational power outlined by Astley and Sachdeva?

1) the hierarchal structure of the organization. 2) control of important resources (money, fringe benefits, knowledge, and work-related expertise) 3) being in a position of network centrality (crucial to the flow of information)

The vice president for public affairs in a small insurance company is in a position that is not accompanied by reward and coercive power. What is his position of power?

A position of power in name ONLY. B/c he has no subordinates!

Which of the following is an example of Dysfunctional politics?

A salesperson uses unapproved techniques, makes the sale, but the customer is unhappy w/ being subjected to high-pressure tactics and vows never to buy anything from the company. The goals of the salesperson has been met but the organization's goal of keeping customers happy and loyal has been thwarted.

Which is an example of Power?

A supervisor, by virtue of the status relationship that gives the person authority over the worker, can use power to order the worker to improve productivity or face the consequences.

What is the general notion of influence?

Any process of affecting behavioral change in others.

Which category of influence tactics involve: making orders or demands, setting deadlines and making sure they are met, and emphasizing rules that require compliance.

Assertiveness

Higher-status people were more likely to use which of the 8 influence tactics?

Assertiveness and Sanctions

What were the 8 categories of influence tactics derived from Kipnis et al. study?

Assertiveness, Ingratiation, Rationality, Sanctions, Exchanges, Upward appeals, Blocking, and Coalitions.

Subordinates tended to use ingratiation, blocking, and upward appeal techniques with what type of managers?

Autocratic managers (task-oriented)

Why is whistle-blowing a type of organizational politics that receives a great deal of attention?

B/c it involves parties outside of the organization (press or consumer protection agencies) and because of the ethical and loyalty implications of whistle-blowing.

When management wants periodic appraisals of workers' performance, why are workers who are involved in long-term activities disadvantaged over those who engage in "quick-and-dirt" tasks?

Because existing appraisal methods do not take into account performance on long-term tasks. (Delay in measurement of work outcomes)

What is the belief of a typical whistle-blower?

Belief that the organization's practices are illegal, immoral, or illegitimate, regardless of whether the criticisms are indeed valid.

Which category of influence tactics involve: threatening to stop working with another person, ignoring the other person or withdrawing from friendship, engaging in a work slowdown.

Blocking

Which of the following is an example of external political behaviors?

Bringing a lawsuit against a company or consulting with members of competitor companies

A group of individuals who band together to combine their power.

Coalition ("Power in Numbers")

Chinese managers rated _______, ______, and ____ were more effective influence tactics.

Coalition, upward appeals, and gifts

Which category of influence tactics involve: obtaining a coworker's support of a request, making a request at a formal conference, obtaining subordinates' support of a request.

Coalitions

The use of punishment or the threat of a punishment to affect the behavior of others. Which of the 5 power bases?

Coercive Power (ex: threatening to demote)

What are the factors that contribute to organizational politics?

Competition for power and scarce resources, subjective performance appraisals, difficulties in measuring important work outcomes, compensation for worker inadequacies, and increased group decision making.

Covering up for a leader who is under legitimate attack. Functional or dysfunctional politics?

Dysfunctional Politics: Although they are being loyal to their boss, having a poor leader can be very harmful. (Compensation for inadequacies)

Political behaviors that detract from the organization's ability to attain its goals. (satisfies personal goals only and not the organization's)

Dysfunctional politics

Which of the following is an example of whistle-blowing?

Employees of chemical companies who have reported instances of dumping of hazardous waste.

Which category of influence tactics involve: Offering an exchange of favors, reminding another of past favors, offering to make some personal sacrifice in exchange for a favor.

Exchanges

Power derived from having certain work-related knowledge or skill. (one of the strongest power bases an individual can possess)

Expert Power

Which of the power bases are forms of individual power?

Expert power and Referent power.

High levels of organizational politics are associated with better organizational communication. True or False?

False: Low levels of organizational politics (not high)

What are the 2 choices that disadvantaged long-term task workers face and can be dysfunctional for the organization?

Focus their energy into short-term tasks or engage in political behaviors to convince management that they are indeed good workers. (takes focus away from the imperative long-term tasks)

Political behaviors that help the organization to attain its goals. (satisfies the goals of both parties)

Functional politics

Expert power are valuable in what type of organizations?

High-tech organizations or companies that are based on knowledge and ideas, such as software development and the development of complex drugs and medical devices.

Which of the following is an example of Functional politics?

If the sale is made through high-pressure techniques (frowned upon by the company) and the customer is satisfied. The goals of both the salesperson and the organization have been met.

What cases is group decision making dysfunctional?

In extremes when group members begin to focus more and more energy into the political process, ignoring the implementation of decisions. Also when decisions are not being accepted b/c of opponents' political savvy and power.

Power derived from personal characteristics that are of value to the organization, such as particular expertise or leadership ability.

Individual Power

The ability to use social forces to affect the behavior of others. (can be viewed as a form of social control or social power)

Influence (resides in the individual themselves)

Which category of influence tactics involve: Using praise or making the other person feel important, showing a need for the other person's help, being polite and/or friendly.

Ingratiation

When attempting to influence one another and to obtain personal favors, co workers used which of the 8 influence tactics?

Ingratiation and Exchange

A meta-analysis suggests that which types of influence tactic are effective for workers?

Ingratiation and Rationality (Not self-promotion tactics)

When seeking personal goals, subordinates tended to use tactics such as _____.

Ingratiation.

According to Farrell and Peterson, what are the three dimensions of political behaviors?

Internal-external, lateral-vertical, and legitimate-illegitimate.

Which group of workers appear to be more tolerant of high levels of politicking, British workers or Israeli workers?

Israeli Workers.

What idea separates organizational politics from power and influence?

It is ALWAYS self-serving.

How is organizational politics viewed by many workers?

It is seen as a significant source of stress, and highly political organizations can experience high levels of turnover and job dissatisfaction.

University professors are subject to delay in measurement with their research activities. What does this lead to?

Leads many to abandon valuable long-term projects for simpler laboratory studies in which the results, and the subsequent publications, appear more quickly. (Delay in measurement of work outcomes)

The formal rights or authority accompanying a position in an organization (manger, shift lead, director).

Legitimate Power

When employees carry out a request simply because "the boss" asked them to do it, they are responding to which power?

Legitimate Power

Which of the power bases are forms of organizational power?

Legitimate, Reward, and Coercive Power.

One study found that top-level managers and lower-level employees believed that there was less politicking happening in their organizations than did managers at which level?

Managers at the middle levels.

How is group decision making a political process?

Members lobby for certain courses of action and engage in a variety of exchanges of factors and support to obtain certain outcomes.

Research has shown a fairly consistent positive or negative relationship between political behaviors and job satisfaction?

Negative relationship.

A type of politics that involve the self-serving, or selfish, use of power or influence to achieve desired outcomes.

Organizational Politics

Marilyn, the assistant marketing director, encourages her boss to assign an important project to Dan, saying, "He's ambitious, and he deserves to handle this assignment." The project requires Dan to sacrifice his vacation time, which Marilyn needs. Later when Dan needs to trade vacation times, Marilyn would be ready to jump right in and offer to switch. This is an example of which of the following?

Organizational Politics

Self-serving actions designed to affect the behavior of others to achieve personal goals.

Organizational Politics

Power derived from a person's position in an organization and from control over important resources afforded by that position.

Organizational Power

Organizational politics is negatively related to _________ and to the incidence of _______.

Organizational commitment; organizational citizenship behaviors.

Subordinates tended to use rational persuasion with what type of superiors?

Participative superiors (relationship-oriented)

Which of the following is an example if a nonreciprocal dependency relationship?

Party A is dependent on party B, but B is not dependent on A, B will have power over A.

What are three informal strategies used to exert influence?

Persuasion, peer pressure, or compliance techniques.

One study suggests that organizational politics are positively or negatively related to work performance?

Positively related to work performance (if workers and supervisors share similar goals).

______ is a consistent force that is likely to work across situations and time.

Power

The use of some aspect of a work relationship to compel another to perform a certain action despite resistance.

Power (resides in the relationship between parities or in their positions)

The concept that for every exercise of power, there is a tendency for the subject to react with a return power play.

Power Corollary

Sources of power possessed by individuals in organizations (French and Raven)

Power bases.

What type of pressure is very common and a very important influence process in work groups and organizations?

Pressures to conform to group norms. (pressure is exerted in the form of criticism, isolation, or expulsion)

US managers rated _______ and ______ as more effective influence tactics.

Rational persuasion and Exchange

A study of supervisors' influence tactics found that ________ was very efface in managerial influence strategy. Which tactics were least effective?

Rational persuasion; pressure tactics (ex: threats)

Which category of influence tactics involve: using logic to convince someone else, writing a detailed justification of a plan, presenting info to support a request along with the request.

Rationality

Which of the 8 tactics were used to institute changes in the work task or in the work context?

Rationality and Coalitions

Power resulting from the fact that an individual is respected, admired, and liked by others.

Referent Power

Power that results from having the ability to offer something positive, such as money or praise. Derives from having control over the resources that others value. Which of the 5 power bases?

Reward Power

What 3 power bases are usually, but not always, tied together in organizations?

Reward, Coercive, and Legitimate Power.

Which category of influence tactics involve: withholding salary increases, threatening to fire someone or to give a poor eval., promising or giving a salary increase.

Sanctions

Which type of influence is more restricted in usage than the more general notion of influence?

Social Influence

What type of leader is the most dramatic illustration of referent power?

The charismatic political leader (able to spur an entire population to action merely because of their admiration and respect for that person)

What were the findings of the Kipnis et al. study?

The choice of influence tactic was determined by: the situation, the status of individuals involved, and other characteristics of the organization such as size and whether or not the organization was unionized. (no sex differences in the use of tactics)

What is the "Peter principle"?

The idea that employees will eventually rise to their level of incompentency. Such workers engage in organizational politics to maintain their positions. (Compensation for Inadequacies)

This dimension of political behaviors refers to whether political behavior involves only members of the organization, or if it extends beyond the boundaries of the organization to include outside people and resources.

The internal-external dimension

This dimension of political behaviors concerns whether the behaviors occurs between members of the same status within the organization, or if it crosses vertical status levels.

The lateral-vertical dimension

According to Raven, what must a leader in order to use Coercive Power effectively?

The leader must be ready and willing to follow through on threats, regardless of the costs involved. He must also be ready to maintain surveillance over the target, to ensure that the target is behaving appropriately.

This dimension of political behaviors concerns whether the behavior is "normal everyday" (appropriate) politics, or some extreme form of political behavior that violates the generally accepted "rules of the game" (inappropriate).

The legitimate-illegitimate dimension

What did Kipnis, Schmidt, and Wilkinson attempt to classify in their study?

The various influence tactics used in the workplace.

How are influence, power, and politics similar?

They all involve getting others to do something.

Possession of work-related expertise was found to be strongly related to...

To supervisors awarding subordinates pay raises.

Which category of influence tactics involve: Obtaining the support of superiors, sending the target person to see superiors, filing a report about the target person to superiors.

Upward Appeals (kiss ass)

When seeking organizational goals, subordinates tended to use tactics such as ______ to try and influence superiors.

Upward appeals and Rational persuasion

Research has shown that tactics of ingratiation works well in what situation?

When used by interviewees in hiring interviews.

Political behavior whereby an employee criticizes company policies and practices to persons outside the organization. (an external political behavior)

Whistle-blowing

What is the result when criteria other than performance, such as dressing a certain way or espousing company philosophy, are overemphasized in personnel decisions?

Workers may make efforts to look good rather perform well. (Subjective performance appraisals)

Organizational politics may be positively related to both ______ and ____, as workers in highly political work environments get tired of the "political games".

absenteeism and turnover

Illegitimate political behavior is most likely to be used by...

alienated members of the organization who feel they have no other alternatives and nothing to lose, such as a worker who is about to be fired.

What are the 5 power bases?

coercive power, reward power, legitimate power, expert power, and referent power.

Competition for power and resources causes organizational politics depending on:

the scarcity of resources and the difficulty to obtain them due to "red tape" or arbitrary allocation procedures.

Political behaviors can be deemed good or bad depending on...

the timing, the circumstances, and the people involved.