Individual Power and Political Behaviors in Organizations

[Schein, Virginia E. (1977), Individual Power and Political Behaviors in Organizations: An Inadequately Explored Reality. Academy of Management Review, Vol. 2, No. 1 (Jan), pp. 64-72]

In organizations, we have different perpetually ongoing and pervasive functions like planning, organizing, directing and controlling. All these functions deal with the usage of available resources in the organization like men and machinery. Employees (men) are an important asset of any organization. But as each individual is unique and they carry their unique personal goals along, the difference between their personal goal and organizational goal creates a conflict between the individual and organization. To avoid that open conflict, individuals try to acquire certain power or favor. That’s why individuals get involved in struggle for power. That’s how struggle for power and its practice become much a part and parcel of the above mentioned functions performed in organizations. By this one could conclude that power and political behavior will also be all pervasive function of the organizational environment.

The paper which is reviewed here narrates this reality and develops arguments.  Power is always acquired on the basis of certain tangible or intangible set of resources which forms the bases of power. Now when one is in possession of some power then one can use it (via means) in order to get our personal goals achieved (intent) using some tactics. In this paper, Schein describes intent of the power holder as the mediating variable between the powers available to them and means to be used. Intent of the power holder is a function of personal needs or goals of individual and the contingency of situational factors. Intent of the power holder will be the deciding variable for the means to be used for getting the needs fulfilled or goals accomplished. There is a strong link between intent and means of using power by individuals in the organization. He put forwarded that whether one’s personal goals are congruent to the organizational goal or not has a strong relation with what type of means one would be using to accomplish that goal. The literature had founded that when individual’s goal was congruent to organizational goal, then that individual had used overt means and when his goal was incongruent to organizational goal then that individual had used covert means. 

Now this is not true that at one time individuals use only one type of means as they are found to be using both overt and covert types of means simultaneously. For example, when an individual’s personal goal is incongruent to the organizational goal, then although he is using covert means to reach to his goal but he will be expressly showing certain overt means which are congruent to the organizational goal. Now in this way the individuals use their powers in order to get their incongruent personal goals achieved without openly going in contradiction with the organization. So in nutshell on the basis of paper one could conclude that the individual intent plays a very important role in evaluation of his political behavior in organization.

[submitted by Kirti Saroha, M.Phil Batch XLI (2017)]

The Ethics of Organizational Politics

[Gerald F. Cavanagh, Dennis J. Moberg and Manuel Velasquez (1981), The Ethics of Organizational Politics, AMR, 6(3) (Jul) 363-374]

The objective of the paper is to develop a normative model of ethical analysis that can be helpful in determining the ethical quality of political use of power within organizations. Power in organization is described in the paper as the ability to mobilize resources, energy, and information on behalf of a preferred goal or strategy [Tushman, 1977] and power is assumed to exist only when there is conflict over means or ends [Drake, 1979; Pfeffer, 1977].

The paper has also drawn distinction between political and non-political use of power. Non-political uses of power are those that involve approved means are used to achieve approved end. Political uses involve when unapproved means, or approved means are used to achieve unapproved or unjustified ends. Paper also highlights the difference between management theory and normative ethics. Management theory tends to focus on 'end justifies the mean'. What a manager should do is determined by the desirability of the consequences of the activity and not on the activities, processes and quality of the behaviors used to achieve that outcome. Normative ethics help to reduce the ethical uncertainty surrounding the political use of power. 

The proposed model in this paper integrated three kinds of ethical theories: Utilitarianism, Theories of moral rights and Theories of justice. Utilitarianism requires a decision maker to select decision which results in the greatest good for the greatest numbers. There are two types of PBAs (Political behavior alternatives) that are typically judged unethical:

(1) when personal goals are preferred at the expense of the societal goals, and

(2) when comparatively inefficient means are used to achieve the desired ends. 

Theories of moral rights assert that fundamental rights of the human beings should be respected in all decisions. Moral rights are like the right of free consent, right to privacy, right to freedom of conscience, right of free speech, and right to due process. One only needs to avoid interfering with the rights of others who might be affected by the decision. Theories of justice require decision of the decision makers to be guided by equity, fairness, and impartiality. Three types of moral prescriptions:

(1) Distributive rules: Individuals who are at equal or similar position should be treated similarly, and individuals who differ in some respect should be treated differently.

(2) Principles of administering rules: Rules should be clearly stated and declared publicly.

(3) Compensation norms: First, individuals should not be held responsible for matters over which they have no control. Second, individuals should be compensated for the cost of their injuries by the party responsible for those injuries. 

All the decisions of the organization taken under the political use of power should be examined under these three ethical criteria. Any ethical criterion is overridden if any significant factor exists to justify that. These factors are called overwhelming factors or situational factors. These overwhelming factors are (1) Conflicts between criteria and Principle of double effect: The good effect is important enough to permit the bad effect. (2) Conflicts within criteria and (3) Lack of capacity to employ the criteria: First, when Decision maker is in partial control of a certain decision and thus unable to employ a specific ethical criterion. Second, when decision maker fail to employ a certain ethical criterion due to a lack of adequate information. Third, when decision maker has strong and reasonable doubts about the legitimacy of an ethical criterion. 

In these cases, decision can legitimately be excused from adhering to that criterion.

[submitted by Anjali Sain, M.Phil Batch XLI (2017)]