Influence Tactics

Description and Foundations

• Power is the ability to exercise influence
• Yukl & Tracey (1992) (p. 127)
  • Found a number of influence tactics that have influence over the follower
    • Ingratiation, exchange, personal appeal, coalition, pressure, legitimating, rational persuasion, inspirational appeal, and consultation
    • Highlight efficacy of rational persuasion, inspirational appeal, and consultation
  • Position power (formalization, rewards, coercion)  vs.  Personal power (charisma, expertise, friendship)  vs.  Political power (coalitions, cooperation)
• French & Raven (1959) (p. 136)
  • A leader’s ability to influence others stems from his or her perceived ability to exercise reward, coercive, referent, expert, and/or legitimate power
• • Greene & Schriesheim (1980)- found that both Instrumental Leader Behavior (ILB) and Supportive Leader Behavior (SLB) will positively influence group cohesion and arousal
    • ILB was more effective in large, newly formed groups
    • SLB was more effective in small, newly formed groups
    • The way leaders administer INDIVIDUAL rewards and punishments influences subordinates’ performance and satisfaction
    • The way leaders administer GROUP rewards and punishments will influence group criterion variables such as productivity, cohesiveness, interpersonal relationships, dysfunctional or inappropriate group member behavior, and the amount of tutoring that takes place.
• Podsakoff & Todor (1985) (p. 143)
  • Leader Behavior and Group Cohesiveness (p. 144)
    • Individuals are more attracted to groups with which they interact, or describe groups as more cohesive, when the individuals receive rewards in the presence of the group’s members than when they receive no rewards or are punished.
    • The reinforcing potential of a stimulus event, and subsequently its effects on an individual’s attitude, is influenced by the manner in which the stimulus is administered
    • “While neither leader contingent punishment nor leader noncontingent reward behavior will be related to group members’ perceptions of cohesion, leader contingent reward behavior will be positively related to perceptions of group cohesion and leader noncontingent punishment behavior will be negatively related to this criterion variable.”
  • Leader Behavior and Group Drive (p. 145)
    • Group drive can be assessed by a group’s aspiration level (Zander, 1971) A group’s aspiration level is a function of individual group members’ perceptions of the probability that the group will be able to achieve success and avoid failure.
    • “Leader noncontingent reward and noncontingent punishment behavior will not be related to group drive”
  • Leader Behavior and Group Productivity (p. 145)
    • “While individually administered contingencies may increase the motivation of individual group members, this motivation may be channeled into behavior which is counterproductive to the group as a whole”
    • Stogdill (1972)-Group drive is generally positively related to group productivity
    • Must have accurate performance feedback
    • “Group members’ perceptions of leader contingent reward and punishment behaviors will be positively related to their perceptions of group productivity, while perceptions of leader noncontingent reward and punishment behaviors will not be related to this criterion variable”
  • Discussion and Conclusions (p. 146)
    • Findings provide little support that leaders who administer evaluative rewards contingently at the individual level will have dysfunctional effects on group processes.
    • Group cohesion, drive, and productivity were found to be positively correlated to leader contingent reward behavior
    • Byrne’s (1971) Interpersonal Attraction Model- can explain the positive relationship between contingent reward behavior and group cohesion
    • A leader who rewards individuals appropriately will also reward the group as a whole when necessary
    • Groups who are rewarded express more cohesion than groups who are not rewarded
    • Greene (1976) found that group cohesiveness caused increases in the productivity of groups that accepted organizational goals but decreased the productivity of groups that did not accept organizational goals
    • Contingent punishment is frequently not related to individual subordinate performance
      • Decreases in employee performance causes increases in the leader’s use of contingent punishment (not vice-versa)
    • Noncontingent rewards were found to be significantly negatively related to group cohesion, drive, and performance
      • Suggests that it is not rewards alone that determine the relationships, but it is how the rewards are administered
    • Leaders who administer noncontingent punishment decrease the group’s motivation to perform
    • Leaders who administer rewards and punishments contingently will have a more functional effect on subordinate AND group performance and satisfaction
  • Cremer & Knippenberg (2005) (p. 150)
    • Focus: leader self-sacrifice on behalf of the group
      • The role that the trust in the leader plays in mediating the effects of leader self-sacrifice on follower cooperation
    • Leader Self-Sacrifice, Trust in the Leader, and Follower Cooperation
      • Self-sacrificial behavior contributes to leadership effectiveness and is an important component of charismatic leadership
      • Self-sacrificing leaders are more influential in motivating followers, elicit more group cooperation, and elicit higher levels of performance in a group
    • The extent to which the leader can be trusted to have the group’s and the group members’ best interest at heart should be a key concern in their attitudes towards the leader
    • The more trust one has in a leader, the more they are willing to go beyond their own self-interest
      • Self-sacrifice was positively related to interpersonal helping
      • Self-sacrifice was positively related to trust
      • Self-sacrifice was positively related to organizational identification
      • Trust and organizational identification were positively related to interpersonal helping; however self-sacrifice was not significantly related to interpersonal helping
    • Discussion
      • Leader self-sacrifice was positively related to cooperation, and this relationship was mediated by followers’ trust in the leader and organizational identification
      • Provides the first experimental evidence for the role of trust in leadership effectiveness
      • First study to test the mediating roles of trust and identification simultaneously

Scholars

• Yukl & Tracey (1992); Podsakoff & Todor (1985); Greene & Schriesheim (1980); Cremer & Knippenberg (2005)

Research (References & Assessments)

Influence Tactics Self-Assessment Yukl, G. & Falbe, C. M. Influence tactics and objectives in upward, downward, and lateral influence attempts. Journal of Applied Psychology. 75(2), 134.

Podsakoff, P. M. & Todor, W. D. (1985). Relationships between leader reward and punishment behavior and group processes and productivity. Journal of Management. 11(1). 55-73.

Cremer, D. D. & Knippenberg, D. (2005). Cooperation as a function of leader self-sacrifice, trust, and identification. Leadership & Organization Development Journal. 26(5). 355-369

Notes

Related Theories

Leadership and Power; Leader Emergence