Sources of Power in Organizations

Project managers often feel like they have no power. And in fact, they typically don't have any in the traditional sense of the word i.e. they don't have managerial responsibility over the people they are trying to coordinate. However, project managers do finish projects so what sort of power do they have over people in their organizations?

Over 40 years ago, researchers French and Raven listed five sources of power within organizations: legitimate, reward, coercive, expert, and referent. Many other researchers have studied these five power bases and searched for others. For the most part, French and Ravens list remains intact. The first three power bases are derived from the powerholder's position; that is, the person receives these power bases because of the specific authority or roles they are assigned in the organization. The latter two sources of power originate from the powerholder's own characteristics. In other words, people bring these power bases to the organization.

Legitimate Power

Legitimate power is an agreement among organizational members that people in certain roles can request certain behaviors of others. This perceived right partly comes from formal job descriptions as well as from informal rules of conduct. Executives have considerable legitimate power, but all employees also have this power based on company rules and government laws. For example, an organization might give employees the right to request customer files if this information is required for their job.

Legitimate power depends on more than job descriptions. It also depends on mutual agreement from those expected to abide by this authority. Your boss's power to make you work overtime partly depends on your agreement to this power. Classic stories of shipboard mutinies, such as The Caine Mutiny and Mutiny on the Bounty, illustrate this point. Today, employees question their boss's right to make them stay late, perform unsafe tasks, and other activities. Thus, legitimate power is the person's authority to make discretionary decisions as long as followers accept this discretion.

People in high power distance cultures (i.e., those who accept an unequal distribution of power) are more likely to comply with legitimate power than are people in low power distance cultures. Thus, an employee in Mexico (a high power distance culture) is more likely than someone in the US (a low power distance culture) to accept an order, particularly when the person's right to give that order is uncertain. Legitimate power is also stronger in some organizations than in others. A 3M scientist might continue to work on a project after being told by superiors to stop working on it. This is because the 3M culture supports an entrepreneurial spirit, which includes ignoring formal authority from time to time.

More generally, employees are becoming less tolerant of legitimate power. They increasingly expect to be involved in decisions rather than be told what to do. "People won't tolerate the command-and-control mode," says Bank of Montreal CEO Tony Comper. Thus, the command style of leadership that often guided employee behavior in the past must be replaced by other forms, particularly expert and referent power, which are described below.

Reward Power

Reward power is derived from the person's ability to control the allocation of rewards valued by others and to remove negative sanctions (i.e., negative reinforcement). Managers have formal authority that gives them power over the distribution of organizational rewards such as pay, promotions, time off, vacation schedules, and work assignments. Employees also have reward power over their bosses through the use of 360-degree feedback systems. Employee feedback affects the supervisor's promotions and other rewards, so bosses tend to behave differently towards employees after 360-degree feedback is introduced.

Coercive Power

Coercive power is the ability to apply punishment. Managers have coercive power through their authority to reprimand, demote, and fire employees. Labor unions might use coercive power tactics, such as withholding services, to influence management in collective agreement negotiations. Team members sometimes apply sanctions, ranging from sarcasm to ostracism, to ensure that co-workers conform to team norms.

Many firms rely on the coercive power of team members to control co-worker behavior. For example, 44 percent of production employees at the CAMI automobile plant in Ingersoll, Ontario, believe that team members use coercive power to improve co-worker performance. The coercive power of team members is also apparent at Eaton Corp.'s forge plant in South Bend, Indiana. "They say there are no bosses here," says an Eaton Corp. employee, but if you screw up, you find one pretty fast.

Expert Power

For the most part, legitimate, reward, and coercive power originate from the position. In contrast, expert power originates from within the person. It is an individual's or work unit's capacity to influence others by possessing knowledge or skills that they want. For instance, civilians working at Canada's Department of National Defence have acquired a lot of power because they know how to operate the bureaucracy. Military personnel are rotated around various Canadian Forces bases, so they depend on the civilians for their expertise as the corporate memory.

Employees are gaining expert power as our society moves from an industrial to a knowledge-based economy. The reason is that employee knowledge becomes the means of production, not some machine that the owner controls. And without this control over production, owners are more dependent on employees to achieve their corporate objectives. This is quite apparent in Canada's high-technology sector, where the skill shortage is so acute that companies have been forced to limit growth. Job applicants can demand generous salaries and preferential working conditions because of their expert power.

Referent Power

People have referent power when others identify with them, like them, or otherwise respect them. Like expert power, referent power comes from within the person. It is largely a function of the person's interpersonal skills and usually develops slowly. Referent power is usually associated with charismatic leadership. Charisma is often defined as a form of interpersonal attraction whereby followers develop a respect for and trust in the charismatic individual.

What Power Does a Project Manager Have?

As a project manager you are often imbued with legitimate power, but sometimes that isn't enough. Likely the least useful power is reward since you likely don't have anyone reporting directly to you and an e-mail praising someone's work will only go so far.

Once you've been with a company for a while, you will likely obtain coercive power. However, even more useful is referent power which you can use to a get a project going or to extract extra effort during crunch time. And with the right background e.g. if you happen to have been a software developer and you are now project managing a software development project, you can use expert power to influence the actions of your team.