Impact of power and politics in organisations Essay

More than 40 years ago, Harold Lasswell (1936) defined politics as â€Å"the study of who gets what, when and how†. Certainly who gets what, when, and how are issues of fundamental importance in understanding formal organizations. Nevertheless, organizational politics and power are both topics which are made conspicuous by their absence in management and organization literature. Therefore, power and politics in an organization can now be defined as the management of influence to obtain ends not sanctioned ends through non-sanctioned influence means. The issue of whether or not organizational politics negatively impacts performance requires a specification of the dimensions that are to be used in evaluating organizational performance. For our purposes, performance in an organization refers to any of the standard indicators of organizational well-being, including profit in the case of a business firms and the ability to get projects completed and within budget with respect to non-profit organizations. Making organizations more innovative, responsive and responsible requires focusing on a number of leadership, power and influence issues. These issues are critical in coping with the strategic environmental with all its characteristics and strategic leader performance in that environment. The issues influence developing teams at the strategic level as well as managing organizational processes linked to values and ethnics, organizational culture, visioning and the management of change, such issues include; †¢ Implementing strategic or adaptive change in the face of formidable resistance. †¢ Fostering entrepreneurial and creative behaviour despite strong opposition. †¢ Gaining resources and support from bosses whose personal agenda might include organizational harmful political games. †¢ Avoiding destructive adversarial relationships with others whose help and cooperation are paramount to your success, but who are outside your chain of command and your direct control. †¢ Building and developing an effective teams in an internal environment where the natural tendency is to conflict with each other. †¢ Fostering organizational excellence, innovation and creativity, and not getting mired in bureaucratic politics or dysfunctional power conflicts. For most leaders in an organization, the key to successful implementing organizational change and improving long term performance rests with the leader’s skill in knowing how to make power dynamics work for the organizational, instead of against it. In John Gardner’s power in organization’s he wrote about leadership and power in organizations, notes, â€Å"of course leaders are preoccupied with power! The significant questions are: what means do they use to gain it? How much do they exercise it? † To what ends do they exercise it? He further states, â€Å"Power is the basic energy needed to intimate and sustain action or, to put it another way, the capacity to translate intention into reality and sustain it†. Power is the opportunity to build, to create, to nudge history in a different direction. The concept of organizational politic can be linked to Harold Lasswell’s (1936) where politics involves the exercise of power to get something done, as well as to enhance and protect the vested interests of individuals or groups. Thus, the use of organizational politics suggests that political activity is used to overcome resistance and implies a conscious effort to organize activity to challenge opposition in a priority decision situation. Because of scarce resources and enduring differences, conflict is central to organizational dynamics and power is the most important resource. Conflict is more likely in under bounded systems (less regulation and control) in an over bounded system with power concentrated to the top. Jeffories makes the point that organizations play the political game within the broader governmental context, but these individuals also play politics within organizations. And power is key in both cases, because it confers the ability both to allocate resources- in itself a way to increase power and to consolidate power by bringing others with similar goals and objectives into the inner decision making core. Drummond, Helga asserted that organization diversity, interdependence, resource scarcity, and power dynamics will inevitably generate political forces regardless of the players. Organizational politics cannot be eliminated or fantasized away. Leaders with s healthy power motive can learn to understand and manage political processes in the organization. Power in an organization is attractive because it confers the ability to influence decisions, about who gets want resources, what goals are pursued, what philosophy the organization adopts, and power also gives a sense of control over outcomes and may in fact convey such enhance control. In conclusion, the impact of politics and power cannot be over emphasized because it is the only means through which an organization can achieve it goals and objectives without being too personal. SOURCES 1. Drummond, Helga (2000): introduction to Organizational Business. 2.Allen, R. W, & Porter, L. W. : Organizational politics and its effects on members. 3. Harold Lasswell: Organizational politics and its effects on members. Organizational behaviour 4. David K. Banner: Designing effective organisations 5. Stephen Robbins: The Truth about Managing People and Nothing but the Truth. 6. Willie E. Hopkins: Aligning organizational subcultures for competitive advantage 7. Mishane and Von Glinow: Organisational behaviour 8. Kreitner and Kinicki: Organizational behaviour 9. Stephen J. Zaccaro: The Nature of Organizational Leadership.

Los Angeles School Police Department Research Paper

Los Angeles School Police Department - Research Paper Example It also serves the communities where these students reside. The Police Officers and the School Safety Officers are given their respective responsibilities to serve the school campuses, surrounding areas, as well as the parking enforcement. The LASPD works with support from the LAUSD and is focused on achieving the safety of children and students (What is the LASPD about). The present study focuses on learning about the LASPD discussing about its various departments, its job structure and rankings, its differences with the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), its impact on the community and the students, and also studies the schools that are protected by the LASPD. Departments within the LASPD: Sworn police officers, non-sworn school safety officers, and civilian support staff are the main employees working for the LASPD. The major departments working under the LASPD are the Chief’s Office, Campus Services Bureau, Administration Services Bureau, Support Services Bureau, and th e School Safety Officers. The Chief of the Police Department is Steven K. ... al Service Centers, the Operations Coordinators, the School Crisis and Mental Health, the Campus Administrators, and other agencies that are associated. It takes the role of preventing victimization of students and promotes an environment for health learning of the students. Any critical incident occurring on the campus is attended by the team at the earliest and various services for protection of the campus and its surroundings and ensures safety for the schools under its charge (Campus Services Bureau). The role of the Administrative Services Bureau is to coordinate and manage the divisions of administration and investigation of the department. As part of its roles, the Bureau supervisions on the Payroll Unit of the department, as well as on other units such as the Budget Services, Records and Crime Analysis, responsibilities related to Custodian or Records, duties of Pitchess Motion, requests of Public Records, Subpoena Control Unit, and the Citation Control Unit. Also, the manage ment of the fleet management, contract administration of the department is considered by the Bureau along with the management of the investigation division of the department (Administrative Services Bureau). The Support Services Bureau of the LASPD is in charge of the operations of off-hour patrolling of the department and the center of communication. The units that are overseen by this Bureau include the Canine, the Safe Passages Motor, and the Parking Enforcement. The support resources of the campus are managed by this team and critical information related to their services is communicated effectively all the way through the District. The Bureau also provides for protection coverage of the District during times when the schools are off intending to ensure safety of the schools and

Violence and Aggression in Human Behavior Essay

Violence and Aggression in Human Behavior - Essay Example Hate crimes and their etiology will be next to explored. Then domestic violence, examining one theory that explains the power dynamics between couples and how these dynamics cause couples violence. Black men, who are more violent than other groups, will next be explored, in the context of the sociological reasons for their violent behavior. Lastly, the way that violence is learned will be explained. Joran van der Sloot savagely attacks a woman with a baseball bat, leaves her dead body and takes off. Ted Bundy kills a multitude of women over a long period of time. Hitler. Charles Manson. John Wayne Gacy. Jeffrey Dahmer. Jack the Ripper. These are just a few of the infamous names that have become household over the years. What causes these men to kill? Is it sociological, psychological, neurological, or all of the above? Jonathan Pincus, MD and Dorothy Lewis, MD theorize that violent criminals are made through a combination of neurological damage, psychiatric illness and abuse. This underlying pathology is the cause of all kinds of killers – one-time killers, serial killers, rage killers and killers who dissociate. Roy Hazelwood, an FBI profiler, contends that killers are disorganized or organized, the disorganized being the one-time rage killers, the organized being the stereotypical serial killer. These causes point to individualistic, psychological, neurological and abu se causes. There are other factors that cause violence as well, sociological causes. Hate is one of these – when individuals stereotype, scapegoat and dehumanize whole groups of people, hate-related violence ensues. Blacks suffer a disproportionate amount of violence, and the causes for this is sociological as well. Violence is learned through cultural expectations, television exposure and through witnessing violence at home. Domestic violence is caused through complex power dynamics between couples. This paper reviews just some of the theories for all types of

Amazon (Kindle Fire) Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Amazon (Kindle Fire) - Research Paper Example In order for it to stay at the top in its sales, more needs to be done to obtain competitive advantage that is essential to get rid of any competition in the prospect. Comparing with the rest of the firms, Kind Fire presents a gap of about $300 for a similar commodity, thus, allowing customers to enjoy significant sales from its target markets. The gap exists because the other firms seek to sell their commodities at $499 while Kind Fire sells its commodity at $199. From the recent market results, Kind Fire has hit a sale of five million in the period terminating on December 2011 although Amazon has already resolved to stop working for this company. In comparison, the market leaders Apple Inc. sold at eleven million for their iPad in the last quarter, thus, presenting an undefeatable upper hand. According to the CEO of Amazon, the company aimed at realizing smaller profits from these devices although in its capacity as the retail company has resolved to dwell in smaller margins a fact ors that only few electronic firms would manage. Comparing to other firms, Kind Fire from Amazon Inc. has revealed excellent pricing strategies, through price elasticity in order, to keep sales high above most influential firms in the sector. According to most analysts, Amazon has not much interest in obtaining a gap in the tablet device market rather it views it as an opportunity to develop into the market for the digital world and make use of the vast opportunities that exist within the target market (Rohida 1). The firm has the chance to present its services to Kind Fire similar to their tests concerning the digital content. In order to realize these objectives, Kind Fire and Amazon have used price as the tool for entering into the market. Price is considered to determine the purchases that occur within the digital and electronic markets. With the emergence of Apple Inc. and other firms that market commodities such as the iPad, the world has presented demand for the commodity alt hough the prices do not favor the customers. Unless a marketer manages to offer his or her product an edge over the competitor’s commodity, only little sales can be realized. Therefore, marketers ought to give their firms an edge over the competitors in order to acquire competitive advantage that serves to augment the sales of firms that manage to establish one. Pricing strategies are offered on various grounds through consideration of different concepts such as the target market, demand, assortment of products offered and the commodity life cycle (Roth 2). Pricing strategies assists the marketer in realizing his or her pricing objective. Therefore, the pricing objective that a marketer prefers assists in the creation of the best pricing strategy. Both the pricing objectives and pricing strategies are guided by the business plan that a certain firm places in the business environment (Roth 2). Selection of a pricing objective precedes the determination of the best pricing stra tegy for the firm. Kindle Fire utilizes the penetration pricing strategy in which the firm seeks to obtain entry into the market environment, especially if there are other already established firms with a similar product. The aim of utilizing this pricing strategy is to attract customers into purchasing products from the new market entrant and improve the market share of that firm (Roth 5). In case the anticipated extents of the

Professional Goal and Action Plan Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Professional Goal and Action Plan - Essay Example For me, being successful in public relations will serve a lifelong purpose as it will help me create an environment that significantly values the importance of interpersonal relations. It is not only for me but for the society. I want to create a difference in the society, and this is the primary reason why I want to become successful in that field. I want to reiterate the value of interpersonal relations in the success of any person, business or culture. Since humans are natural social beings, the field of public relations is important as it helps in creating the environment, values and morals of the society (Reddi, 2009). It gives a hand in shaping people’s perspectives and reveal the truth and facts behind things in a manner that laymen can easily understand. The first thing that I need to do is specify my goals. In this section, I need to create a specific objective statement which corresponds to the smart action plan. The smart goal contains a statement which is specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and time-bound. Without these important aspects, I wouldn’t be able to create an action plan that is relevant to my goal. ... The primary function of a public relations practitioner is to advise the management of the impact of its policies to the public and to relay the impact of business moves and policies to the public (Johnston, et.al., 2009; Narula, 2006). Breaking this down, a public relations publicist are: â€Å"to advise management on policy and its effect on public relations, to channel and coordinate within an organization the activities that affect public relations, to provide the mechanics for explaining an organization and its policies to its various publics through communication media and to ascertain and explain to management what various publics think about the organization† (Johnston, et.al., 2009). In this regard, I believe that the role of a public relations practitioner is to guide not only the public of what is happening within the business by relating the policies to the masses’ experience but also to inform the business industry of the impact of their policies to the pub lic (Botha, et.al., 2007). This is an important ground in creating policies and defining changes and development within the business in order to be better and to be able to gain the trust and confidence of the public. The different areas of public relations are the following: communication, publicity, promotions, press agentry, integrated marketing, issues management, crisis management, press secretary or public information agent, public affairs or lobbyist, financial relations, communication relations, internal relations, industry relations, minority relations, media relations, public diplomacy, event management, sponsorship, cause relationship marketing and fundraising (Johnston,

Harry potter Community Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Harry potter Community - Assignment Example Fantasy and illusion may hide these realities but they exist and I know that for sure. Perhaps this is the reason why I see myself in him. Why I am comfortable and at ease to write about this as my discourse community. I can identify with him and his world. If it weren’t for the timely response of the nephew, Harry, a person listening in on the conversation would not have known of the reason why that day was considered by Mr. Vernon as the best day of the week. So what if there is no post on Sundays? The family does not like receiving letters? Are they angry at the postman? – These are just some of the questions that the listener to the conversation would ask. The truth is, the reason goes deeper and is even uglier than the answers to these simple, innocent and trivial questions. Mr. Vernon likes receiving letters for that meant that people liked him well enough to write to him. He feels important when he receives letters. When he found out that his nephew, a â€Å"nobody† and a person who just eats scraps from his table and wears his old oversized clothes were receiving letters that angered him. How could a â€Å"nobody† be more important than him? Because of his mounting anger, he took to getting the letters addressed to the nephew from the postman and burning them. A tedious task for he had to wait for the postman. He has been doing this for a week now and he truly felt relieved that he would not be doing it again that day. On this day, the nephew was standing near the window awaiting orders as if he was a footman. He was not allowed to sit on the chairs in the living room. A privilege enjoyed only by the immediate family. This unspoken rule was meant to show hierarchies in the household. When the conversation began it was just between the immediate family. To further emphasize the exclusivity or the

Merger between Huge Co. and Computers Co Case Study

Merger between Huge Co. and Computers Co - Case Study Example Both sides worry about the merging of benefits, both afraid that their benefits they've gotten accustomed to will be replaced by the other's benefit program. Both programs have advantages and disadvantages. Huge Co. offers a program that aims for the long term needs of its employees. Their program ensures the employees' financial stability after retirement. Their program also takes care of the employees' health, as well as the company's budget. The only possible down side to Huge Co.'s benefits program is the management's lack of feedback on their employees' satisfaction with the said program. Computers Co.'s benefits program is very flexible but it is flexible to the point that it allows its employees to only think of their short term needs. Their program is high on the satisfaction of their employees but also high on the company's budget. Taking all good and bad things into account, a possible compromise may be reached. Since both companies individually have good and bad sides to their benefits programs, the best program can be made out of the good parts in both of them. The two companies operate with a "cafeteria plan," as they call it, which is good for the employees so that they can fit the benefits to what they truly need. This is even more applicable considering the age differences in the employees, which translates to the differences in their priorities in life.