The Five Bases of Power - Essay Example

Analysis of the three scenarios in Corporate A’s case reveals all organizational five sources of power. The first source of power is reward power, where a leader can influence the behavior of individuals under him through rewards - for instance, through granting of bonuses (Morgan, 2006). In this source of power, the employees are motivated to work hard to gain certain rewards.
The second source of power in an organization is expert power, where an individual possesses significant knowledge or skills in a certain domain in the organization's operations. In most cases, the individual performs a duty or responsibility that others cannot undertake to the same level and hence is an important asset to the organization. Since the organization does not wish to lose such an individual, it seeks to make them comfortable and thus submits to their requests. Employee 2 draws his power from being the only expert accountant in Corporate A. Since he is the only individual who can prepare the company’s financial statement he has negotiated for a 4-day work-week that is inaccessible for the rest of the employees in the accounting department. His being the only Certified Public Accountant is a source of power within the organization.
The other basis of power in organizations stems from personal characteristics. Having individual special qualities such as charisma and people skills results in admiration from the rest of the workforce and management and thus places one in positions from which they can gain an audience within the organization. Charismatic qualities make certain employees convincing enough to side with, besides making their ideas attractive. This is certainly the case for Employee 3 who despite having not been in Corporate A longer than the other employees is already influential in the company. The rest of the employees are attracted to his positive and charismatic personality, and this is a source of power to him as we can see his project idea being spiritedly adopted by the department.
Coercive sources of power are felt in the case where leaders create the perception of threats to the employees. This can either be through making others believe that the individual may implement punitive measures, reprimand them or withdraw certain advantages. Individuals can also coerce the management to listen to their wishes for example by threatening to withdraw service through labor unions. The marketing manager coerces his staff members to work beyond the minimum by threatening to withdraw end-year bonuses which for individuals like Employee 1 are crucial if they are to afford certain desired things.
The last source of power is legitimate/positional power which is wielded by leaders within organizations by being appointed to head other employees. The extent of positional power is dependent on the position one holds, for instance, middle-level managers, and senior managers among others. Corporate A scenario presents three examples of positional power the marketing manager, the accounting department manager, and the sales manager who lead employees in their respective departments.

Relationship between Dependency and Power
According to Murphy and Willmott (2009), there is a relationship between power and dependency because the power resides implicitly in another person’s dependency. Examples of this can be seen in Corporate A, where the marketing manager wields power over employees who are dependent on him due to his discretion in distributing rewards. Due to the various sources of power within organizations as discussed previously, a scenario arises where there is reciprocity in the power dependence. For instance, while the accounting manager has positional power, he interacts with Employee 2 who bears expert power, or in the sales department where the manager’s positional power is confronted by Employee 3’s power. Thus, the marketing department shows an imbalance of power and thus dominance by the manager while the sales and accounting departments show a balance of power.