Influence Processes

Influence processes

Introduction

CEOs and presidents yield power that they use to influence people and employees in organizations. The way this power is exercised is what determines the influence it will have on different people (Shamir, House, & Arthur, 1993).  Leadership can be in the form of non-coercive influence being used to achieve the groups or organization’s goals, motivate the behavior of workers towards the achievement of these goals, and help in defining the group’s or organizational culture. Leadership can also be in the form of coercive influence being used to achieve the organization goals and define its culture. Influence can be examined as the interpersonal process of changing a person’s or a group’s initial thought, feelings, behavior and goals (Shamir, House, & Arthur, 1993).

The various types of influence processes and the factors that can affect them

Influence processes in management include; direct decisions, allocation of resources, reward system, selection and promotion of other leaders and role modeling (Shamir, House, & Arthur, 1993).

Direct decision

This process gives the leaders the ability to influence the choices made by their seniors. This influences the organizations by the power of the leaders to formulate the mission and vision aspects of an organization. They determine the organizational structure and the leaders are given the power to dictate over all the activities of the organizational (Shamir, House, & Arthur, 1993).

Allocation of resources

Organizational resources such as money, human and technological resources are decided on by the leaders. This affects the overall activities of the organization. The leader has the power to allocate money to a department that is clearly in need and also reduce the resources that are allocated to a department that do not require much or misuses the resources (Shamir, House, & Arthur, 1993).

Reward system

Leaders use rewards to influence the performance and behavior of their employees. The rewards could be in the form of money incentives or other non material rewards such as praise. The rewards are intended to direct the behavior of the workers towards attainment of organizational goals (Shamir, House, & Arthur, 1993).

Selection and promotion of other leaders

Leaders can give more power to some of their employees so as to achieve the goals of the organization. This also cultivates good leadership among the junior leaders. Moreover, good leadership demands that leaders should not hoard power but distribute it appropriately (Shamir, House, & Arthur, 1993).

Role modeling

The leaders are expected to portray the behaviors that they wish their employees to show. They should act as role models to their followers because the followers are likely to take the path that their leaders take. The leader is expected to posses high moral and ethical standards and the employees will have the same qualities (Shamir, House, & Arthur, 1993).

The influence processes can be affected by different factors that include charisma, legitimacy, expertise, relationships and even personality. The factors can be related to leadership qualities and they have a big significance on the kind of influence that a leader impacts on his followers. These leadership skills determine the way in which the followers respond to the influence processes used by the leaders. The attitude of the leader determines whether their followers will conform or resist (Cartwright, 2009). In situations where leaders use so much force, the followers resist and they follow rules and execute their duties because they have to but not because they are happy doing them. If the leaders are flexible and friendly, they establish a good relationship with their followers. This makes the followers to perform their duties well because they enjoy doing them. These factors interact to determine how effective the influence processes will be (Cartwright, 2009).

Andrea Jung

Direct decisions: in decision making, she has the responsibility of making direct decisions about the organization’s structure and strategy. These critical decisions cannot be made by anyone else other than the CEO. She made the decision to develop her beauty and cosmetics industry through internet sales (Yukl, & Heaton, 2002).

Allocation of resources: he used her power as the CEO to reduce staff costs by $300m.she also allocates a big amount of money to the research and development program in her organization.

Reward system: this leader uses any rewards to motivate the top sellers. The commonly used rewards were summer vacation offers (Yukl, & Heaton, 2002).

Selection and promotion of other leaders: she brought the revolutionary idea that there was not supposed to be women past middle management. 85% of the top management leaders in the company are currently women (Yukl, & Heaton, 2002).

Role modeling: she is a model to workers and the community and to prove this she changed the company’s motto to “the company of women”. This shows that women have a very big significance in the development of the society and working arena. She is determined and courageous to show that it is possible to have successful female managers.

Indra Nooyi

Direct decisions: they are made by the leader and they are specifically a domain of those with utmost power. She is able to turn ideas and plans into reality. This is evident in making the fast food restaurants diverse in their services and acquiring the Tropicana and the Merger with Quaker oats (Yukl, & Heaton, 2002).

Allocation of resources: Nooyi used an influence process in the allocation of resources whereby she redirects a quarter of Pepsi’s marketing dollars to social media and digital promotions. She promoted community projects and promotions of the organization’s products. She pays much attention to the community projects as a way of doing well to the people and providing the best training to employees, best tools, and offering opportunities for development. Hard work and rewarding employees are the values in her firm.

Reward system: she considers it necessary to reward workers for their good performance. Top sellers are rewarded greatly and this is supposed to be a form of motivation to the sellers and also encourage all sellers to work hard and achieve the best for the firm. She also sends hand written appreciation to the best performing sellers (Yukl, & Heaton, 2002).

Selection and promotion of other leaders: this is supposed to be done keenly by the senior leaders such as the CEOs. Nooyi does not promote other leaders in her firm and she engages in micromanaging the firm and as a result many executives have left. This interference with the junior leaders’ activities can influence an organization separately. The negative influence is seen in the employees and in turn seen in the buyers.

Role modeling: she plays a role modeling part in her firm by practicing the behaviors that she wants the employer to show. Hard work is one of the behaviors used to model the behaviors of the sellers. She is also a role model to young girls in her native homeland which is India. By participating in the activities of her form, she shows her commitment and dedication (Yukl, & Heaton, 2002).

Brenda Barnes

Direct decisions: she uses decision making to improve the economic performance of her firm.

Allocation of resources: she allocated extra resources to the R&D and marketing to promote develop the amount of sales per year. She also reduced the marketing budget in 2009 to increase the profit margins after she had increased it in the previous year.  Her decisions also included redirecting from non-core businesses to core businesses (Manz, 1986).

Reward system: employees are rewarded according to their performance. She also ensures diversity in the work place as an extra reward to the employees.

Selection and promotion of other leaders: she hires a new president to the firm. She holds that the process of selecting and promoting employees to higher ranks of leadership should be done very carefully because the kind of leaders selected are likely to influence the performance of an organization (Manz, 1986).

Role modeling: Barnes plays a role modeling roles as a working mother and executive who had a controlled work-life balance. She was able to spend quality time with her family and at the same time performing excellently as the head of the firm. She promoted the value of a family and re-launched the firm to be “women’s network” (Manz, 1986).

Conclusion

These influence methods affected the organizations in a positive way because it is evident that the workers are more committed in their work. These influence processes are exercised by charismatic and authentic leaders who inspire their employees to achieve their well communicated goals for the organizations. In order to facilitate these influence processes, qualities of good leadership must be applied in the working areas. These qualities enable clear communication of the organizational goals, and establishing a good relationship between the leaders and the employees.

 References

Cartwright, D. (2009). Influence, leadership, control. New York: Unwin.

Manz, C. C. (1986). Self-leadership: Toward an expanded theory of self-influence processes in organizations. Academy of Management review, 11(3), 585-600.

Shamir, B., House, R. J., & Arthur, M. B. (1993). The motivational effects of charismatic leadership: A self-concept based theory. Organization science, 4(4), 577-594.

Yukl, G. A., & Heaton, H. (2002). Leadership in organizations. New York: Pearson.

 

 

 

 

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