Type author

Myers, Hulks,names
and Wiggins
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Organizational Change:
Perspectives on Theory and
Practice
Chapter 7: Changes from the
Perspective of Power and Politics

1
 Where we are:

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 Power and politics as a perspective

Myers, Hulks, and Wiggins: Organizational Change

• 3
 Key topics

Myers, Hulks, and Wiggins: Organizational Change

• Power and politics and their 4
 Power

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• 5
 Conceptualizing power

Myers,
• ThreeHulks,main
and Wiggins:
waysOrganizational Change
of conceptualizing power 6
 Individual power bases

• Positional power - derived from your formal position;

• Coercive power - your ability to threaten others and
carry out threats
• Expert power – derived from knowledge and
experience
• Information power – derived from access to data
• Reward power – ability to reward others
• Personal or referent power – ability to get others to
do what you want because they like you
 
French and Raven ( 1958, 65)

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 Power and politics hidden from view

• ‘Political behaviour sometimes takes the form of two

or more armed camps publicly fighting things out, it is
usually much more subtle. In many cases it occurs
completely under the surface of public dialogue’
(Kotter and Schlesinger, 1979, p108)

• ‘Power is at its most effective when least observed’

(Lukes, 2005, p1)

• ‘Invisibility and intangibility cannot be equated with

insignificance’ (Buchannan and Badham, 1999, p57)

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 Defining politics

• From Greek word ‘polis’ meaning city state. Aristotle

advocated politics as means of reconciling need for
unity in the polis with recognition there were diverse
interests
• Two categories of definition of organizational politics
(Zanzi and O’Neill, 2001)
– Unitarist: emphasizes collaboration; activities such as
politics seen as aberrant because not directed to shared
organizational goals
– Pluralist: acknowledge inevitability of politics in activities of
sub groups in an organization competing for limited
resources

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 Defining politics

• Challenging because not purely theoretical

• Often underlying criticism of political
behaviour
• Notion of politics as illegitimate or
unsanctioned key element of many definitions
(Poon, 2003) but who decides what
behaviour is sanctioned or not? And does that
make some wrong because they are not
sanctioned? E.g. whistleblowers’ activities

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 Defining politics

• Assumption individuals playing politics for personal

gain contributes to ‘taint’ associated with politics
• Games and war frequently used metaphors
– Colloquially talk of ‘playing politics’
– Organizations as political or games arenas ( Ferris
et al, 1996; Mintzberg, 1985)
– ‘Winning the turf war’ (Buchannan and Badham,
2008)
– Tactics of outwit, outplay or outlast (Connor, 2006)
• Perception of politics very important, regardless of its
actual existence (Ferris and Kacmar, 1992)

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 Relevance of power and politics

• When an organization in midst of change likely to be

an increase in political behaviour
– More uncertainty and ambiguity, harder to anticipate
consequences which increases uncertainty, amplifying
likelihood of political behaviour as individuals feel can no
longer rely on the old rules and procedures
– Low trust climate, people more suspicious of other’s motives
and intentions and informal and unsanctioned behaviours
more likely to be labelled as political

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 Impact of politics on change

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 Relevance of power and politics

• Change agents need to engage in politics if they are

to be successful (Buchannan and Badham, 2008)
• In their anonymous survey of 250 managers
– 60% agreed that ‘politics become more important as
organizational change becomes more complex’
– 79% agreed that ‘politics can be used to initiate and drive
useful change initiatives’
– 81% agreed that ‘politics can be effective in dealing with
resistance to change’
– 93% agreed (21% strongly) that ‘politics can be used to slow
down and block useful change initiatives’
– Only 9% agreed with the item, ‘change agents who avoid
organization politics are more likely to succeed in their
roles.’
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 A metaphor for change agents

• Front stage
– Rational arena of action
– Public performance of rationally considered and logically
phased change
– Plans, Gantt charts, resource planning, KPIs and milestones

• Back stage
– Seeking support informally
– Blocking resistance
– Influencing, negotiating, selling, deliberately tailoring
messages
Buchannan and Boddy (1992)

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 Political Interventions

• Coalitions as political alliances

• Politics of presenting ideas for change
• Stakeholder mapping
• Commitment planning

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 Coalitions as political alliances

• Coalitions are the coming together into groups of those who

share particular interests or want to advance specific
approaches to change
• Coalitions are primary means by which individuals go from
being on the same wavelength to being allies who willing to
devote resources ( time, contacts) to a common effort
(Bacharach and Lawler, 1998)
• When more people involved, and are organized, an issue can
become more visible and the group potentially more powerful
• Leaders need a powerful guiding coalition for change (Kotter
and Cohen, 2002)
• Coalitions can also form from different levels within an
organization and can be for or against change

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 Presenting ideas for change

• Politics sometimes about drawing attention of senior

people to influence their views on change. Also
known as issues selling
• Ways of packaging issues:
– Using the logic of the business plan
– Persistence
– Incrementalism
– Bundling
• Also draw on strategic, relational and normative
knowledge
Dutton et al, 2001

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 Stakeholder mapping

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 Commitment Mapping

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 Resistance

• Resistance often presented as THE major difficulty

implementing change ( Grey, 2003)
• Literally means a restraining force that attempts to
maintain the status quo
• ‘Intentional acts of commission or omission that defy
the wishes of others’ (Ashforth and Mael, 1998, p90)
• Often perceived negatively by leaders and managers
but somewhat arbitrary to label one behaviour an act
of power and another an act of resistance (1994)
• ‘power and resistance are embedded in a dynamic
relationship that tends to be mutually reinforcing’
(Ashforth and Mael, 1998, p90)
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 Traditional approaches to resistance

• Dominant assumption is that leaders should

analyse resistance objectively and have the
right to ‘deal’ with resistance
• Four sources identified by Kotter and
Schlesinger (1979)
– Parochial self-interest
– Misunderstanding and lack of trust
– Low tolerance for change
– Different assessment because access to different
data

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 An formula for analysing resistance

C only of (ABD)>X where

• C = the change
• A = level of dissatisfaction with status quo
• B = desirability of proposed change or end
state
• D= practicality of the change (minimal risk
and disruption)
• X = ‘cost ‘of changing
(Beckhard and Harris, 1987)

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 Psychological approaches to resistance

• Focus on the point of view of those resisting

• Non judgemental, maintaining that whether
positive / negative or rational / irrational
largely a matter of perspective
• Framework offered by (Ashforth and Mael,
1998)
– Targeted versus diffuse resistance
– Facilitative versus oppositional resistance
– Authorized versus unauthorized resistance

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 Other approaches to resistance

• Resistance as ambivalence (Piderit 2000)

– Resistance too blunt to capture subtlety of
employee responses to change
– Capture attitudes on cognitive, emotional and
intentional dimensions
• Reframing resistance as a product of change
agents’ sensemaking (Ford et al, 2008)
• Value of resistance
– Provides important insights
– Keeps talk of change ‘in play’

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 Ways to approach resistance

• Communication
• Participation and involvement
• Education and support
• Negotiation and agreement
• Manipulation and co-optation
• Explicit and implicit coercion
• Problem finding
• Role modelling
• Changing reward structure

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 Key points

• A political perspective on change draws attention to

the dynamics of power and influence which can be
amplified during the uncertainty caused by
organizational change
• Exercise of power often hidden
• Opposing interest groups may form coalitions for or
against change
• Resistance may take different forms
• Working with power and politics, ‘back stage’ is a
critical skill for change agents

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