Personal aspect management - Essay Example

In the organizational context, influencing implies commitment to the desired result enough to spend needed energy to achieve it. The concept of influencing is connected with commitment defined as a state of being in which employees become bound to a particular actions by a belief system that sustains those actions and their own involvement. In many situations (conflicts, disputes and decision-making) influencing is important as an instrument to achieve some preconceived state or desire (Fabian 54).

It arises out of a felt need (important enough to cause use of energy) and a mechanism (the control over resources needed by others) that allows for possible improvement of that need. According to Beardwell et al (2001) the power sources include legitimate, expert, reward, coercive, referent. These sources of power are intentional and instrumental in its use. Leaders and managers activate them only as they value the possible outcome sufficiently to expend needed energy in power action. The process of persuading employees is based on argumentation and reasoning.

Persuading process can be explained as a relationship in which an employee independently weighs reasons another person. Armstrong (2001) underlines that persuading is central to man's continuing concern for administration and organization. How people organize and relate to each other to get planned goals accomplished is central to organization and administrative theory. The overreaching problem of organization life is securing follower compliance. This compliance comes without losing the long-term amicable relationship between the person desiring compliance and the person whose behavior change we seek.

And this must be done with an eye on conserving scarce resources. Influencing and persuading allows management to guide employees and customers, their actions and preferences (Austin, Pinkleton 38). Influence and persuasion are commonly exhibited through orders the managers issue to someone subordinate to them. They can be seen as coercive resource employees get by virtue of authority grants from those above and below us in the social structure. It is often logical, reasoned, legitimate, and systematic in its application and use (Barham, Conway 45).

A number of studies have demonstrated that situational factors moderate the attitude-behavior relationship. Individuals differ profoundly in their use of persuasive message strategies. Certain people consistently employ manipulation and deceit, whereas others eschew these tactics. Some people use emotional appeals, whereas others resort to threat. Research has examined individual differences in compliance-gaining attempts to determine the impact that personality and demographic factors exert on message strategy selection.

First, participants in the various studies are probably more mindful and self-conscious about their message strategy selections than are communicators in the real world By asking respondents to respond to a series of hypothetical scenarios or to construct a persuasive message, researchers found that respondents reflected on their persuasion behavior (Hannagan 49-52).In the workplace, supervisors who clearly identify the performance expectations of their subordinates and inform them of their degree of conformance to the stated requirements may be providing their subordinates with feelings of control and reducing their feelings of uncertainty.

Employees who know that they are acting