Organizational Behavior & Leadership - Essay Example

Coercive power is the power of a manager to exact fear as a form of punishment or penalty for subordinates or rank and file employees who commit some forms of misdemeanors against company rules and regulations. Referent power is a particular leader’s ability to influence subordinates through charisma or certain personal attributes that the rank and file can identify with, making them quite devoted to that leader. Referent power usually makes the manager practice more affinity with his or her subordinates that would make them more of a mentor, rather than the exacting leader or manager.

While this may embolden employees to emulate their heads’ or supervisors’ mild managerial approaches, it affects the way the leader is able to apply leverage in cases where disciplinary action must be enforced. And last, but not the least, is expert power which shows the manager’s cognitive ability or knowledge in a particular field making the manager the expert from whom the employees can gain information, so they can do their particular jobs successfully (Turner, n.d. b). The marketing manager of Employee 1 uses both the legitimate power and the reward power, because Employee 1’s manager is able to require him to work forty hours and beyond a week within the legal bounds of his authority as a manager in the organization.

Likewise, Employee 1’s manager utilizes his ability in motivating employees to work hard beyond their normal office hours by reminding them of the yearly bonus, which will be given to them accordingly, should they pass and get an outstanding rating on their next evaluation. And this is what propels Employee 1 to work very hard, so he can get the bonus in order to avail of his dream vacation. Aside from utilizing the legitimate power and reward power, Employee 1’s manager also employs coercive power since all the employees in the marketing department are being constantly reminded that if they want to get the hefty bonus then they must spend more working time for the company.

Although punishment for not working beyond the regular hours was not mentioned in the given scenario – the employees assigned in the marketing department are not only motivated by wanting to get the bonus but also of the fact that if they did not perform well as per the pending evaluation, they silently dread any fine or penalty that may be imposed for substandard work performance. The accounting manager of Employee 2 uses the expert power because he recognizes the ability of Employee 2 who is the only certified public accountant in the accounting department of Corporation A.

And since Employee 2 is the only person who can prepare the financial statements of the company, he agreed to allow him to work in a compressed work week schedule of four days a week; so long as the expected work output is realized within the given time frame allowed by the organization. Employee 3, on the other hand, has a very positive and charismatic personality that often makes people like him. Employee 3 was made a team leader because he also has the innate ability to influence others with his ideas; they, at first, seemed sceptical to his way of thinking but at the end totally agreed with him.

Employee 3 has the knack of referent power, which can inspire others to think like he does, despite the fact that he has been employed within Corporation A for only a short period of time