Compare and Contrast Power and Politics in Organizations

This paper will compare and contrast power and politics in organizations, and also in this paper there will be an analysis of organizational management and leadership practices that impact organizations. Along with two real-world examples of the relationship between power and politics; and how they relates to management and leadership practices.

Power is the ability to have someone else to do something you want done, or the ability to make things happen or get things done the way you want (Schermerhorn, Hunt, and Osborn, 2008, p. 214). This is also known as a person, group, or nation that has influenced or control over others. In a business setting there are two types of power: positional and personal. The use of power on a person’s behavior is called influence.

Positional power in a business setting is the authority or influence given by a position or office on whoever is filling or occupying that position. There are six aspects of positional power that a manager can use; reward coercive, legitimate, process, information, and representative power. A manager may use reward power to help with the control of people. This could be anything from money, promotions, and compliments. Coercive power for when he or she is with holding or threatening to withhold rewards, and legitimate power, which the manager thinks because of his position in the business he has intrinsic power to approve or deny items such as vacations, time off, or overtime. This power only works if the employees or subordinates respect or they believe that the manager has the authority to do so

Process power is the power given to a manager to control the processes of production and information power, which is the access of the control of information or methods. Information given is on a need to know and this is determined by the worker’s position in the Power and Politics in Organizations 

The majority of organizations are not just managers make all decisions but there are some organizations that have democracy. There is usually a structure of differing levels of management and secondary, which is known as those with authority and those without. Many known wherever there is power there are politics. There are some similarities and some differences between the two, in reality they tend to operate as a group so often that they reallybecome part of the same force. It is important to understand how they compare and contrast in order to fully understand how they work together. 
Power and politics in organizations go with each other. In organizations, politics are predictable. In comparing power and politics it first helps to understand the means. Power is the ability to get someone else to do what you want him or her to do. Powers focus in administrative positions draw from three sources: rewards, punishments and legitimacy. The reward source is where managers reward employees to get what the manager wants them do, while the punishment source uses punishment as a means to get people to do what a manager wants them to. The legitimacy source is in the organization where the culture is that the boss holds the power. Organizational politics involves the use of power to obtain ends not officially authorized and the use of power to find ways of balancing individual and collective interests in otherwise difficult situations. The connection between power and politics is that politics and politicians use power to obtain control. It depends on how the politics are used as to whether or not they are constructive or unconstructive. Politics already have a negative connotation, but they are not always negative. Organizations are bound to have politics because when there are many people in the organization, everyone's opinion may count. 
How roles of politics and power play in organizations. When used efficiently they can.