Key Terms

Authority

Represents the right to seek compliance by others.

Bases of power

The five bases of power are referent, expert, legitimate, reward, and coercive power.

Bureaucratic gamesmanship

A situation where the organizations own policies and procedures provide ammunition for power plays.

Coalition

A situation where one unit can effectively increase its power by forming an alliance with other groups that share similar interests.

Coercive power

Involves forcing someone to comply with one’s wishes.

Counterpower

Focuses on the extent to which person B has other sources of power to buffer the effects of person A’s power.

Expert power

Occurs when person A gains power because A has knowledge or expertise relevant to person B.

Leadership

The ability of one individual to elicit responses from another person that go beyond required or mechanical compliance.

Legitimate power

Exists when person B submits to person A because B feels that A has a right to exert power in a certain domain.

Normative power

Rests on the beliefs of the members in the right of the organization to govern their behavior.

Politics

Involves those activities taken within an organization to acquire, develop, and use power and other resources to attain preferred outcomes in a situation in which there is uncertainty and disagreement over choices.

Power

The probability that one actor within a social relationship will be in a position to carry out his own will despite resistance.

Power dependencies

A state where all people are not subject to (or dependent upon) the same bases of power.

Referent power

A state where allegiance is based on interpersonal attraction of one individual for another.

Resource dependence

When one subunit of an organization controls a scarce resource that is needed by another subunit, that subunit acquires power.

Reward power

Exists when person A has power over person B because A controls rewards that B wants. These rewards can cover a wide array of possibilities, including pay raises, promotions, desirable job assignments, more responsibility, new equipment, and so forth.

Strategic contingencies

A requirement of the activities of one subunit that is affected by the activities of other subunits.

Utilitarian power

Power based on performance-reward contingencies; for example, a person will comply with a supervisor in order to receive a pay raise or promotion.

Work centrality

The more interconnected subunit A is with other subunits in the organization, the more central it is.

Work to rule

Occurs when employees diligently follow every work rule and policy statement to the letter; this typically results in the organization’s grinding to a halt as a result of the many and often conflicting rules and policy statements.

Workflow immediacy

Relates to the speed and severity with which the work of one subunit affects the final outputs of the organization.

Workflow pervasiveness

The degree to which the actual work of one subunit is connected with the work of the subunits.

Source contents: Principles of Management and Organizational Behavior. Please visit OpenStax for more details: https://openstax.org/subjects/view-all