The abuse of power within the workplace PDF

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Abuse of Power and its Effect on Society...

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Abuse of Power and its Effect on Society The abuse of power within an organization will always affect the workplace to a certain extent. “Power in the workplace exists even when a business owner sets out to establish a system without any formal hierarchy” (Smallbusiness.chron.com, 2018). The way a business owner chooses to exercise their power shapes the dynamic of the work place as well as how they work independently, it can lead to a genuine dissatisfaction as well as resistance among the workforce. However, there are people who are more affected by power than others and there are people who tend to be in power. We will discuss the differences between the two and their characteristics in more depth throughout this essay. Another topic we will discuss throughout this essay is the abuse of power that has been big news for the last few years. The sexual harassment allegations on celebrities who were loved and adored by millions seems to be growing more and more every year, in this essay we will discuss the effect this abuse of power has had on society. When taking a look into the abuse of power within the workplace it is imperative to analyse what type of personal traits are most likely to neglect power, and what traits accept power within the workplace. Firstly, what is power? “Ability to cause or prevent an action, make things happen; the discretion to act or not act. Opposite of disability, it differs from a right in that it has no accompanying duties.” Power within the workplace can be separated into seven different categories. According to Vivian Giang of The Business Insider the seven categories consist of legitimate power, coercive power, expert power, informational power, reward power, connection power and referent power, we will explain this in more detail later on in the essay. Adding – “How a person chooses to use power in a workplace context depends greatly on the employee's personality and position within the company.” Highlighting the extent to which the topic of power is extremely broad and complex making it difficult to explain through one single definition. Looking back at the definition of power and linking it to the possibility that internals look to control their environment, it could be said an element of power may need to be used in some circumstances where an individual wants to control what is happening around them. This line of argument is supported by the academic journal ‘Power to the powerless: locus of control and the use of power’ by Barry. E Goodstadt and Garry a. Hjelle. In the article, forty male students from Bockport university took part in a compulsory experiment for their course. Half the students scored the highest for internal locus of control, and the other half the highest for external locus of control. The university students (subjects), unaware of their internal/external score, were to supervise three high school students (workers) without meeting them. The procedure later explained that the workers were to receive 100 extra credits for one of their courses, and in fact, did not exist and their performance was all preprogramed. The subjects were told if they maintained the production levels at or above specific standards it was considered satisfactory performance, and in the past showed this was suggestive of real life managment skills. The subjects believed the workers were to complete two tasks, firstly a coding task and then a crossing out task. All workers started on the coding task, however, were told the crossing-out task was an alternative, more tedious job that payed less money. When the three workers finished the tasks, the output was brought to participants who had a range of delegated powers they could use depending of the quality of the work. An example of one of these powers was the ability to fire workers if output was poor. After the experiment took place Goodstadt and Hjelle concluded that internals had the expectation that they have the power to influence others, in this case, the troubled worker. Therefore, internals are more likely to use persuasive powers and thus, be more dominant in a persuasive setting i.e. the workplace. When linking the two papers together it can be seen that the findings of Goodstadt and Hjelle, and Thomas, Lillian and Kelly both correlate to show the extensive use of power, influence and persuasion being traits belonging to an internal locus of control. Therefore, highlighting the dominant effect that internals may have on the workplace. As seen through their potential ability to persuade others with more ease, and the overall feeling that they look to retain control in work more actively than externals (Thomas, Kelly, Lillian 2006). Abuse of power can take various forms. Examples include: bullying or harassing behaviour, requesting staff to do personal errands or favours, pressuring staff to distort facts or break rules, interfering with the ability of a colleague to work effectively” (United Nations Educational, Scientific and cultural Organisation: Abuse of Power or Authority, 2017). Examples of abuse of power are widely seen in organisations. When employees move higher on the command chain, they receive a sense of power which can easily be used in an inappropriate way. This could be; using their power to gain information that should not be available to them or taking advantage of someone. When someone gains power, people become easy to manipulate. This is seen in the movie, The Devil wears Prada. The film focuses on two main characters, Miranda and Andy. Miranda, played by Meryl

Streep, who has a reputation for playing strong female roles, is the chief editor of runway magazine and Andy, is her assistant. From the beginning of the movie, Miranda looks down on Andy because of the way she looks, dressed in oversized jumpers with mane like hair. Miranda treats Andy differently from others because she does not fit in no matter how good she is as an assistant, which has an impact on how the rest of the employees treat her too. Because Andy decides to wear what she feels most comfortable in, she is not taken seriously by her other work colleges. As a result of this, Andy chooses to change her appearance in order to gain some respect at work. The day Andy arrives at work wearing designer clothes with a fresh new haircut, she starts to be treated better from both the staff and her boss. This shows Miranda was not treating Andy like her colleges because she did not like the way she was dressed, which is a clear abuse of power. Unlike the Devil Wears Prada, where all staff have to dress in the same style, in the article ‘Sexuality, power and resistance in the workplace’ by Peter Fleming, the staff working at Sunray Call Centre were encouraged to dress as exotic as they like. The paper considers whether encouraging sexuality in the workplace characterizes an opportunity for employee resistance or increased management control. Throughout the paper, it argues that expressed sexuality usually controls overall organizational life. Furthermore, it suggests that organizations can deal with sexuality within the workplace in two ways; they can consider themselves to be ‘de-sexualized spheres’, meaning they want everyone to act appropriately a nd dress appropriately, in other words, expressing your sexuality in the workforce is not encouraged. On the other hand, some organizations believe that promoting sexuality in the workplace will result in employees feeling a sense of freedom. Meaning they can dress as they like and express their sexuality as much as they want. As stated above, Sunray Call Centre promoted sexuality. This approach seems to have a positive outcome on the workers since the business receives a reputation for having highly motivated staff, which is not common in call centres. Because they allow their staff to dress freely, it changes the whole atmosphere of the company, making it overall, an enjoyable place to work. However, expressed sexuality can in some cases be linked to sexual harassment. Abuse in the workplace is more apparent than ever as we have seen in the past year with the ‘Me Too Movement’. Many believe that this has only been around for a short time, but it was actually ‘created’ in 2006 by civil rights activist Tarana Burke. She created the movement to help women of colour who had become ‘survivors’ of sexual abuse and harassment. In October 2017, this movement was reignited when the many allegations of sexual abuse and harassment came to light about Harvey Weinstein revealing just how much he abused his power. One extreme example of this was allegations by the actress Ashley Judd, who claimed that he would damage her career if she did not watch him shower or give him a massage (Harvey Weinstein's accusers, 2018). This is a clear abuse of power that he has used multiple times on his victims for personal gain. One of the effects that this has on society is the effect on Weinstein’s company, resulting in having to declare bankruptcy in March 2018 and then being bought over by a private-equity firm for $289million (Desta, 2018). This meant a large number of workers lost their jobs. Another example is the paper ‘#Me Too: A Study on Sexual Assault as Reported in the New York Times’ by Alyssa Evans, which primarily talks about the coverage of the ‘Me Too Movement’ and how it does not really include a diverse background of victims but primarily focuses on Caucasians. However, reading through the text you can see clear examples of abuse of power and ultimately the effect abuse of power has on the victims. Harvey Weinstein alone has had around 50 different allegations made towards him and the effect this is having on society is substantial. He also abused his power by only commenting on Lusitania Nyong’os allegation towards him after he denied the rest. Until then, he had publicly denied her accusations, which shows he used his power to publicly shame this woman, potentially because of her colour. Power is not the same as leadership, but it does contain aspects of it, as leaders influence their followers. Power in organizations have three identifiable forms; power over (as previously mentioned), power to and power from. ‘Power Over’ is when one person has command over somebody else or a group of people, in a sense that dominance and coercion are used. ‘Power To’ gives employees in an organization more freedom as power is shared. This can also be known as empowering staff. ‘Power From’ is the ability to resist power of other employees by completely ignoring their demands. As well as these powers, they can also be defined as ‘French and Raven’s five bases of power (1959)’ (Power and Leadership: An Influence Process, 2012), which include two categories. First, organizational, containing; Coercive and Legitimate power and Personal, containing; Expert and Referent power. Reward Power is a managers/ supervisor’s ability to influence their subordinate’s behaviors in return for rewards such as bonuses, praise, promotion and recognition. This can lead to a better performance overall as employees will be more motivated to obtain these rewards. The first organizational category contains ‘Coercive Power’ (Power Over). This the capability to have an effect on someone’s behavior by punishing them or making a threat to do so. Punishments include

reprimands, demotion, suspension and dismissal. This type of power should be used carefully as it can have a negative result towards those who use it. Most organizations have policies on treatment towards employees so that this type of power is used sparingly. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people in positions of power who abuse it and threaten their employees into what they want with these punishments, this is not what being a good leader is. You may recognize this type of behavior from our previous example of the Harvey Weinstein allegations. The second organizational category contains ‘Legitimate Power’, which is the ability to influence employees due to the position that they hold at the business. Those with positions, where they hold power, understand they can only ask co-workers to do things that are in the range of their authority. ‘Legitimate Power’ only has a narrow span before the manager/supervisor can overstep. An example for Legitimate power is, if a manger needs someone to stay late at work to complete a task this is them exercising their authority. The personal category contains ‘Referent Power’ and ‘Expert Power’ the former is when behaviors can be controlled because subordinates idolize their superiors or potentially have work place relations. It could also be because somebody aspires to be like them, for example if a celebrity represents a business, they hold a significant amount of power as they can influence consumer choices into what to purchase. The latter is the ability to effect individuals through recognized knowledge, skills and abilities. For example, when ill people follow their doctor's advice, this is them exerting their power by telling them what to do. Although specialists can be granted power at low levels of business, this might only be to control out with the business and them themselves have no power within the specialized field. A great deal of power that is held is dependent on the level of the business an employee is situated at. The higher the level the higher the power. As leaders and power influence behavior, the two must be linked. It is up to the leader how they utilize the power. If done correctly, outcomes can be positive resulting in job satisfaction and task completion whereas if power is abused it could result in staff absences and higher turnover. Going back to the ‘Me Too Movement’ the majority of abusers were of higher authority. This means they are mistreating the power given to them. As seen with Referent power, if the abuser is admired people respect them. So, it is not surprising Weinstein’s abusing power led to his respect disappearing and his business and workers being affected. Thus, proving that the effect Harvey Weinstein had was compliant with that of an external LOC. In conclusion, abuse of power in organizations affects the work place to a certain extent. How a person chooses to use power depends on their personality and position within the organization. Characteristics such as internal and external locus of control highly influence work outcomes. While reviewing the two papers by Goodstadt and Hjelle and Thomas, Lilian and Kelly, we found they both concluded that internal LOC’s are likely to retain more control within the work place than externals. We also concluded than externals are more likely to abuse power as shown in; the recent news on Harvey Weinstein, the ‘Me Too Movement’ and the film ‘The Devil Wears Prada’. In all three examples and in all academic articles used in this essay, there is one dominant theme; abuse of power does have an effect on our society.

References (1)

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