Power Base Development

Leadership and Power Base Development: Using Power Effectively to Manage Diversity and Job-Related Interdependence in Complex Organizations
Barton J. Michelson
Mention the word power and what comes to mind? Power is evil, corrupt, self-serving, manipulative, hurtful, and possibly “America’s last dirty word.”1 These words speak to the dark side of power. There is, however, a positive face to addressing power acquisition, power-base development, and power use. The purpose of this article is to consider power as a positive force that is continually used to achieve organizational, group, and individual goals. When power is used in an ethical and purposeful way, there is nothing evil about it. This paper posits that leadership is the exercise
A power-base development model is constructed to show various deployments of power. This model establishes an interactive link between a leader’s power base and alternative influence strategies that produce positive power dynamics. The significance of this proposed model is that it accentuates the leadership role in developing positive organizational and interpersonal relationships that are predicated on the employment of certain known power bases in an organization. The power dynamics described in this model apply to all organizations regardless of size, goal, mission, technology, and so forth. The structure of the model is fashioned from a review of recognized and accepted literature on power theory, power-base formation, leadership, and organizational dynamics. The works of John Kotter, Rosabeth Moss Kanter, David A. Whetton, and Kim S. Cameron were invaluable in constructing an expanded model that displays both the dependent and interdependent relationships considered critical to power acquisition, power transformations, power dynamics, and organization effectiveness. The model’s design will
Several studies suggest that influence strategies can be classified into three broad categories: retribution, reciprocity, and reason (table 6).15 David Kipnis and others have developed several general strategies of leader influence.16 They list the most to least popular strategies found in their three-nation study of managerial influence styles as shown in table 7. Another researcher, Gary A. Yuki, lists 11 forms of influence and a summary of leader and target-person requirements for each strategy.17 Table 8 identifies the different forms of influence. The research on influence strategies indicates that each approach listed in the classifications has advantages and limitations. Effective leaders generally use combinations of various strategies for different purposes and under different conditions. The challenge of complex organization diversity and job-related interdependence requires a leader to select the proper influence strategy to produce positive power dynamics. Leaders should avoid the pitfall of overreliance on and overuse of a particular influence strategy. Excessive use of an influence strategy could lead to abuses of influence that may provoke resistance leading to diminished leader influence over time. It is important to maintain a balanced perception between the leader’s power and the target persons to be influenced. You do not want to place the target persons in the position of perceived helplessness or feeling