Leadership and Power Paper

Leadership and Power

Leadership is defined “as the ability to influence a group toward the achievement of a vision or set of goals(Judge & Robbins, 2014).”  Power is defined as “ the capacity or potential to influence. (Northouse, 2013).”  The idea of power and leadership are related because they both aim to influence.  According to French and Raven’s bases of social power there are five types of power; referent, expert, legitimate, reward and coercive.  These five types of power describe different forms of power and how they aim to influence others.  Within an organization there are two forms of power; position and personal. These two forms of power combine the five types of social power into two categories. We know that leadership and power are similar therefore there is a relationship between influence and power.  

Power and How it Relates to Leadership

As mentioned previously, power is the potential to influence (Northouse, 2013).   Leadership cannot exist without influence, influencing others is basically how leaders lead.  Power has the ability to effect ones actions, beliefs and attitudes toward something. Although they concept of power and leadership are related they both influence differently.  Power can persuade an action by force.  Depending on the role of power it can force someone to do something against their will.  For example your boss (person with a position of power) can say; you have to work on Saturday to help out my son’s school or you will be terminated.  To keep from being terminated you are going to your work on Saturday even if it is against your will because it has nothing to do with your job.  In this same situation under the concept of leadership, the leader would influence you to work on Saturday voluntarily.  Out of mutual respect a good leader would ask you to work to help out his son’s school and it would be more voluntary than mandatory.  You would be more inclined to help for the benefit of your leader this way.  

“To lead or influence people effectively, you must have a sufficient power base (Bacon Ph.D., 2011) .”  Based on the readings in “The Elements of Power: Lessons on Leadership and Influence” by Terry Bacon “there are eleven sources of power: five personal sources (knowledge, expressiveness, history, attraction, and character), five organizational sources (role, resources, information, network, and reputation), and one meta-source, (will)” (Bacon Ph.D., 2011) .  These elements of power allow for greater possibilities of being influential.  For example; most people are motivated by a person that is knowledgeable, knows what they are doing and can communicate effectively.  All of these elements of power are similar to the five major leadership traits; determination, intelligence, integrity, self-confidence and sociability.  

The Various types

The five types of social power improve a leader’s abilities to influence the attitudes, behaviors or values of individuals.  Referent power is based on how the follower identifies with the leader and how much they like the leader.  A supervisor that is respected by his or her employees has referent power.  Expert power is based on how knowledgeable followers perceive a leader to be.  A Psychologist studies behaviors therefore they are perceived t be knowledgeable in this area so they have expert power.  Legitimate power is based on “status or formal job authority (Northouse, 2013). ”  A principal who suspends a student is showing legitimate power.  Reward power is based on a leader rewarding followers.  A supervisor who buys lunch for all the employees because they met a deadline is using reward power. Coercive power is the ability to discipline or punish individuals.  A teacher that takes recess from students due to bad behavior is using coercive power.