Power is defined as the potential to control people and events through convincing them or coercing them. Power is also the advantage that all leaders possess to govern a particular people or society. Power can be used for the good of everyone or might be misused. In history, there have been great leaders who are praised for their noble ideas and concern for people and the environment while others are the reason for the current problems facing the world. Power can be political, social or physical. Power may also be utilized to influence people’s behaviors and transactions from a business perspective. There are different types of powers, and the most common ones are; the expert power, the legitimate power, the referent power as well as the coercive power and the reward power.
Coercive power is exercised by using threats to get the employees to work. It may be by threatening to fire, demote, or transfer them if they don’t perform. With the fear of losing their jobs, the employees get the job done as required. According to Andersen (2016), the belief is that the leader can punish his junior workers for noncompliance on the duties ordered. The effects are gruesome to the employees since most will not feel the motivation to work. Employees do not work well under pressure for constant fear of being sacked. The working environment becomes toxic.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Reward power is whereby the leader rewards the performing employees with gifts, promotion, travel opportunities and also less difficult positions in the company. This way, the other employees get the motivation to get the rewards just like their colleagues. Therefore, everybody works hard. Reward power, however, is ordinarily short term therefore long-term productivity is never achieved.
Legitimate power is another type of power whereby a leader in an official position in government or an organization has some advantage in place than the other people. A person in a top job can convince the other people using his company’s position. His power to influence is regarded higher than the other leaders who do not have a place.
Expert power is whereby a leader uses his skills and technical know-how to influence people. Leadership development is nurtured, and lessons and skills are learned from one employee to another (Avolio, 2011). Expert power is the rarest exercised power since it is precise. The leader shares new ideas now and then on how the employees should work. Expert power is regarded as the most effective since it is peer to peer.
Referent power refers to the power exercised by celebrities and media personalities through their massive following on social media platforms. Despite being celebrated at a particular career, they can influence their followers in other different aspects. Referent power is quite an effective way of controlling people to purchase a product, and it is widely used by many businesses to target a specific demographic.
Leadership Style and Its Influence on Employee Performance
There are various leadership styles like Autocratic leadership, democratic leadership, strategic leadership style, transformational leadership, team leadership, cross-cultural leadership, facilitative leadership, laissez-faire leadership, transactional leadership and coaching leadership, charismatic leadership, and visionary leadership.
From the above leadership styles, democratic leadership is considered the best style to manage employees. According to Doucet (2015), the style entails fairness, creativity, courage, honesty, competence, and intelligence. Democratic leadership is widely praised for inclusivity to all races and genders. Employees are encouraged to raise any concerns they have, and an amicable decision is agreed upon.
The democratic leadership style has a positive influence on all its employees. Employee performance can be analyzed by meeting set deadlines, efficiency in doing work, employee competency and executing defined duties. Evaluation of the leadership styles is done to find interconnection between effective leadership styles and the overall performance of employees, exploring the leadership styles that contribute to employee performance (Bushra et al, 2011). The style approach is characterized by the philosophy of “I share.” A decision is reached after all members have participated. Theoretically, democratic or passive style of leadership is regarded to be the most appropriate style of leadership.
Decision making, for example, is time-consuming in a large organization because of the bureaucracies that come with it. In a smaller organization or company, the leader has the advantage of working and reaching out to every single employee personally, therefore, have a different style of approach to influencing.
References
Avolio, B.J. (2011). Full Range leadership development, Sage, thousand Oaks , Calif
Andersen, J.A. (2016). An Old Man and The Sea of Leadership. Journal of leadership studies,
Bushra, F., Usman, A., Naveed, A. (2011). Effect of transformational leadership on employees’ job satisfaction and organizational commitment in banking sector of Lahore (Pakistan). International Journal of business social science.
Doucet et al, (2015). Leader profiles and their effectiveness on employees’ outcomes. Human performance .
