For Synco_Solutions: Short Answer Essay Questions - FINAL Exam
Lesson Six: Power and Leadership Styles
Lesson Five discussed some modern concepts of ethics for businesses, including socially responsible investing, corporate social responsibility, and environmentalism. Lesson Six will introduce some of the types of power wielded by leaders, as well as the dichotomy between transactional and transformational leadership.
Various Types of Power
So far we’ve discussed some qualities loosely associated with successful leaders (Lesson Two supra) and some behavioral theories that attempt to explain leadership success (Lesson Four supra). However, another very important concept with respect to leadership is that of power derivation. Although leaders obviously vary in the degree of power that they wield, researchers in the field of management have codified a taxonomy of different types of power which may be employed by different leaders and under different circumstances. As with most academic theories, there are many different versions of this taxonomy, and scholars don’t agree perfectly as to the details. The original postulate by French, Raven, and Cartwright (1959) included five types of power. Since then, the list has been expanded by others to six, seven, or even more, depending on who one talks to. For the purposes of our discussion, however, we will discuss just three of the most prominent types from the original model. It is worth noting beforehand that there is no tangible evidence to suggest that any one of these types of power is significantly more effective or valuable to a leader than any other. Instead, they each may be utilized with constructive finesse or destructive clumsiness, depending on the individual leader and the circumstances surrounding his or her leadership.
Legitimate Power: Legitimate power is the kind of power that is derived by virtue of the authority vested in one’s title within an organization. Perhaps the most intuitive example of a setting in which legitimate power is highly emphasized is the military. In the military, the degree of influence, command, and respect that an individual possesses is a direct reflection of that individual’s rank. Because military institutions (in the United States and elsewhere) commonly develop cultures where organizational hierarchy is placed front and center, ranks beget authority, and extraneous factors that might otherwise be involved are less relevant. As an example, a colonel is a colonel, and whether or not a colonel is popular, or attractive, or a likeable person, is far less relevant to the authority of a colonel. This isn’t to say that these other factors don’t matter at all. However, they take a distant backseat to the title that one carries.
Referent Power: Perhaps most juxtaposed to the idea of formal power is that of referent power. Referent power is the kind of power that a leader derives from the quality of the relationships that he or she develops with followers. Thus, this power is largely dependent on the personability of the leader. How well-liked is he? How supportive is he? When followers are in need, does he express concern and act caringly? Do followers respect him because of his character as a person, rather than the authority of his title? (Male pronoun used only out of convenience and conciseness). In this sense, the fact that a leader has a high degree of referent power says a lot more about the quality of such a leader’s character, than does a high degree of legitimate power.
Expert Power: A third type of power is that of expert power. This power is derived by virtue of the expertise that one possesses in the field within which one works. Classic examples of expert power can be found in places such as law firms and hospitals. Attorneys wield a heavy degree of power and influence over paralegals and support staff, because when it comes to the nature of the work being done (legal), they are presumed to know most and best. Likewise, doctors typically perform only the most complex and difficult tasks in the scope of patient care because their knowledge, skills, and training typically far exceed those of nurses and assistants. As with some of the general leader qualities discussed in Lesson One supra, expert power is something that can be faked, so long as a leader can convincingly mask ignorance.
French, Raven, and Cartwright also included reward and coercive power---the ability to manipulate follower behavior through offering rewards or threatening punishments, respectively---in their original taxonomy. However, in addition to being types of power themselves, these concepts are also strategies that leaders of any type may use as a means to influence followers through adoption of a transactional leadership paradigm, discussed below.
Transactional v. Transformational Leadership
Behaviors aside, one of the most important dynamics affecting leadership success is the difference between transactional and transformational leaders. Transactional leaders rely on a strategy of give and take in order to induce support and cooperation from their followers, and this comes in two varieties: reward leadership and coercive leadership. In reward leadership, leaders use positive reinforcement to motivate followers. This is the proverbial “carrot” that is dangled, and can include such incentives as additional pay (commissions, bonuses, etc.), extra time off, prestige rewards, and others. The other type of transactional leader is the coercive leader, who uses not positive but negative reinforcement to drive behavior. Instead of offering rewards in exchange for desired behavior, these leaders threaten punishments for undesired behavior. This might take the form of strict disciplinary policies for conduct violations (Ingram, n.d.).
Transformational leaders don’t rely on reward or punishment. Instead, they look to inspire followers through belief in a common vision of the outcome of a group’s efforts (Bass & Riggio, 2006). One classic example of a transformational leader is Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Dr. King never offered any tangible incentives to the freedom riders and their followers, nor was there any real punishment for abstention from participation in such activism. In fact, the only certainty about involvement in the civil rights movement during the 1960s was a very real threat of harm, at least in some parts of the country. However, people followed Dr. King nonetheless, because his charisma and passionate vision inspired them to struggle for a better future for their children.
Ethical Implications
Just as leadership qualities and behavioral theories raise questions of leadership ethics, so too do the concepts of power and leadership style. The following sections review ethical considerations of these types.
Power Taxonomy
Lord Acton famously said: “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men" (Acton Institute, n.d.). Indeed, power has a way of distorting the judgment of leaders, and typically not for the better. Legitimate power can be an effective tool to maintain order in a rigid system of authority such as the military, but a drawback is that this kind of power does not require the leader to make any effort to earn the authority he or she wields. Aside from the effort required to acquire a title, there is no incentive for legitimate power leaders to worry about respect or voluntary support from followers, because it makes no difference in these contexts, and thus, these paradigms can lead to abuse of power. Referent power, on the other hand, requires the exact opposite: a focus on relationships. And as such, leaders relying on referent power are much more powerfully motivated to act in the best interests of followers at all times. Finally, concerning expert power, this can be an ethically-neutral source of power, but as discussed in Lesson Four supra, it is important that leaders not exploit their intellectual superiority over followers for personal gain at the expense of others.
Transactional v. Transformational Leadership
With respect to transactional leadership models, a very common ethical criticism is that they tend to cause followers to ignore the ethical implications of their actions. For example, reward-based leadership, or incentivizing behavior with “carrots”, soils an otherwise clean conscience because such practices are, in effect, bribing followers to perform acts, not because they are ethically sound, but instead because of the reward offered. In this sense, followers in a reward paradigm could be looked at as hollow shells of human effort without any incentive to consider their own moral compasses. Likewise, coercive leadership is criticized in the same way, except that instead of bribing followers to induce desired behavior, “sticks” essentially arm-twist followers into pursuing courses of action that avoid punishments, and not because they are interested in doing the right things (Kanungo, 2001).
In terms of transformational leadership, it is considered by most researchers to be ethically superior to transactional models. Again, as discussed above, MLK Jr. didn’t have to rely on rewards or punishments to induce action from followers, and therefore followers are more thoughtfully invested in their actions. However, it is important to note that not all transformational leaders are righteous figures. Adolf Hitler is another textbook example of a transformational leader; he used his incredible charisma, his unmatched talents as an orator, and his passion for nationalism to bring the world to one of its darkest hours ever. So it is in any leadership context; talents for leadership may be used in both positive and negative ways.
Conclusion
In this lesson, we discussed some of the types of power wielded by leaders, as well as the dichotomy between transactional and transformational leadership. In Lesson Seven, we will discuss the various stages of moral development within individuals, as well as the way moral intensity is rationalized on a case-by-case basis.
References
Acton Institute (n.d.). Lord Acton Quote Archive. Retrieved from http://www.acton.org/research/lord-acton-quote-archive
Bass, B. M., & Riggio, R. E. (2006). Transformational leadership. Psychology Press.
French, J. R., Raven, B., & Cartwright, D. (1959). The bases of social power. Classics of organization theory, 311-320.
Ingram, D. (n.d.). Transformational leadership vs. transactional leadership definition. Chron. Retrieved from http://smallbusiness.chron.com/transformational-leadership-vs-transactional-leadership-definition-13834.html
Kanungo, R. N. (2001). Ethical values of transactional and transformational leaders. Canadian Journal of Administrative Sciences/Revue Canadienne des Sciences de l'Administration, 18(4), 257-265.
