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The Interview Process

The Management Pocketbooks Pocket Correspondence Course

This is part of an extended management course. You can dip into it, or follow the course from the start. If you do that, you may want a course notebook, for the exercises and any notes you want to make.


Interviews are an essential part of management: conducting them and also being interviewed from time-to-time, for promotions or a new job.

Interviewing others

Finding people’s faults is an easy task, and one most interviewers take to with relish. It serves little purpose, however, since we all have plenty of them.  The primary purpose of a job interview is to find their talents, skills, expertise, motivation, enthusiasm…

These are what makes it worth considering someone for employment. Only then should you be evaluating whether any shortcomings raise the risk of employing that person too high.

Pocketblog covered the topic of interviewing in some depth in our three-part series: ‘The New Manager’s Guide to Interviewing’.  It covered:

  1. Preparing the Ground
    Increase your chances of success well before the interview.
    It covers how to:

    1. Think about the job requirements
    2. Handle the advertising and admin
    3. Review applications
    4. Prepare for the interview
  2. Getting it Right
    Hints and advice for conducting and effective interviews.
    It looks at:

    1. Questioning
    2. Social skills
    3. Responding to candidates’ answers
    4. Inviting questions
  3. Polishing your Process
    Tips and tricks of the trade, such as:

    1. Fact checking
    2. The ‘horns and halo effect’
    3. Psychology
    4. Data protection

Being Interviewed

If there were only one tip that I could give to any interview candidate it would be this one:

Fundamentally, when you go for a job or promotion interview, your interviewer only wants to know one thing. All of their questions are just variants on one question – different ways to get at one answer.

And if you know what that question is and make sure that you answer it every time, by giving a different part of your answer to that one question with every answer you give, then you will have taken every opportunity the interviewer has given you.

The Question

So, what is that one question your interviewer wants answered?

‘Why should I recommend you for hiring or promotion?’

And how do you answer that? Simple. You have to tell them the benefit they, or their team or department, or their organisation will get from making that choice. And that boils down to the most fundamental question that humans ask: ‘what’s in it for me?’

Interview question and answers

That then begs the question: what do they want? To optimise your answers you have not only to show that you can deliver what they want, but you must also do your preparation and find out what they want. Six things are particularly common:

  1. Safety and Security
    Employers – and interviewers – often want to avoid mistakes. Can you show that you are a safe choice; that you meet all of their fundamental requirements and have a track record to back that up?
  2. Performance
    What evidence can you give to show that your performance will be exceptional? Some employers want stars.
  3. Quality
    If the organisation puts a strong focus on quality in its materials, then so should you in your answers. Demonstrate your attention to detail and drive for perfection. Your written materials and personal appearance must reinforce this message.
  4. Ease of Transition
    In some circumstances, an employer is looking for an easy life. They are under pressure and don’t want to work hard to get a new staff member trained and ready. Like a good convenience meal, you need to show how you can deliver to the standard required with the minimum of preparation.
  5. Cost
    Beware of employers looking to minimise cost. If you do find one offering an attractive role, prepare your negotiating options in advance. Trial periods can make sense. But emphasise the difference between remuneration and employment costs and identify how employing you can be cheaper than a less experienced and less ‘expensive’ candidate.
  6. Staying Power
    One of the biggest costs of employment is the recruitment process. If your prospective employer is looking for someone who will commit to their organisation for a long time and you have changed jobs every 18 months, you will need to prepare a very fine answer to that challenge.

More on being Interviewed

Our earlier blog, ‘Seven ways to Interview well’ has… seven more great tips.

Further Reading

The Interviewer’s Pocketbook

Succeeding at Interviews Pocketbook

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Backwards and Forwards

Pocketblog comes out on Tuesdays, which means that this year, it coincides with both Christmas Day and New Year’s Day.  Which means that there will be a short hiatus before the next edition.

But never fear – I shall be busy.  I will be preparing for next year’s exciting new project.  More about that later.  But first…

The Best of 2012

As before, here is a selection of my own favourite Pocketblogs from 2012.

Early in the year, we did two blogs about Emotional Intelligence: ‘There’s more to Emotional Intelligence than Daniel Goleman’ and then offered practical tips to ‘Boost your EQ’.

Emotional Intelligence

In this Jubilee year, we let you into The Management Secrets of Queen Elizabeth II.  Sadly, advance orders for the Modern Monarch’s Pocketbook have been disappointing (we just received our third, with the same address as the last) and we are holding back on publication until orders pick up.

The Modern Monarch's Pocketbook

Another big event for us was the launch of our Management Pocketblog 100 Day Challenge.  We know (from orders) that some of you took it up.  Please do tell us (on the blog page comments) about your experiences.  If you have not yet, it is not too late to take up the challenge.

The Management Pocketblog 100 Day Challenge

We were able to offer readers insightful business and management tips from to impeccable sources this year.  In ‘What matters today, in Business and Management?’ we extracted tips from Time Magazine’s 2012 100 Most Influential People in the World.  In ‘The Oracle of Omaha’, we took guidance from some of Warren Buffet’s top CEOs.

Our three-part series: ‘The New Manager’s Guide to Interviewing’ will be a helpful resource if you are new to this role.  It covered:

  1. Preparing the Ground
    Increase your chances of success well before the interview
  2. Getting it Right
    Hints and advice for conducting and effective interviews
  3. Polishing your Process
    Tips and tricks of the trade

And, for people on the receiving end, we wrote ‘Seven Ways to Interview Well’ just for you.  If you want to stick with your current job, but spice it up a little bit and renew your motivation, try ‘Same Job: New Job’.

Edward de Bono's Six Thinking Hats

Closest to my own heart were:

Our three-part series about dealing with poor performance in staff, ‘Let’s sort out poor performance’, parts:

          1. Infrastructure
          2. Turnaround
          3. The Alternative

These followed on from two blogs, ‘What is Performance Management?’, and ‘The Root of the Issue: Dealing with Poor Performance’.

Bruce Tuckman: Group Development model...  forming - storming - norming - performing - adjourningOur blogs about Bruce Tuckman’s model of Group Development (Forming-Storming-Norming-Performing) continue to be the most heavily read.  In February, we provided a link to all four of them.

.

And finally…  Pocketblog honoured two sad losses this year: Neil Armstrong, the astonishingly humble all-American/all-global hero; and Stephen Covey, who wrote one of the very best of the best personal effectiveness book: The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.

Neil ArmstrongStephen Covey


Coming Next Year

Pocketblog is nearly 3 years old (we started on 23 February 2010) and has chalked up over 150 posts to date.  It’s time for a little refresh.  So 2013 will see a new style of Pocketblog.  Not a radical departure: more of a shift in emphasis.

Next year, we’ll be presenting our Management Pocket-Correspondence Course.  Over the course of the year, we’ll be blogging about the full range of management skills in a structured way.  Why not Subscribe to the Blog by email (towards the top of the column to the right of this) to receive them all in your inbox.

Until then…

From everyone at Management Pocketbooks…

Have a very merry Christmas,
and a happy and healthy New Year.

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Six times Four: More de Bono

Last week, I discussed Edward de Bono’s (or maybe his and others’) Six Thinking Hats.  In my blog title, I described his mind as fertile and that fertility led, step by step, from:

  1. Six Thinking Hats (1985) to:
  2. Six Action Shoes (1991)
  3. Six Value Medals (2005)
  4. Six Frames – for thinking about information (2008)

We’ve listed the six hats.  Let’s do the same for the others.  Whilst I own copies of Six Action Shoes and Six Value Medals, it was only in researching this blog that I learned about the newest book here, so I am indebted to Professor Tortoise for the primer in the Six Frames.

Six Action Shoes

Six Action Shoes - de Bono

Navy Formal Shoes
Represent formal routines, processes and procedures.

Grey Sneakers
Represent exploring, investigating and gathering information.

Brown Practical Brogues
Represent practical, pragmatic, roll-your-sleeves-up action.

Orange Gumboots
Represent safety-conscious activities and emergency action.

Pink Comfy Slippers
Represent caring, concerned, compassionate and sensitive action.

Purple Riding Boots
Represent leadership, authority and command.

Six Value Medals

Six Value Medals - de Bono

Gold Medal – Human Values
Values relating to putting people first.

Silver Medal – Organisational Values
Values relating to your organisation’s purpose.

Steel Medal – Quality Values
Values relating to your product, service or function.

Glass Medal  – Creativity Values
Values relating to creating, innovating and simplicity.

Wood Medal – Environmental Values
Values relating to sustainability and impact on the community and on society.

Brass Medal – Perceptual Values
Values relating to the way things appear.

Six Frames for Thinking

Six Thinking Frames - de Bono

Triangle Frame – Purpose
Understanding the information at hand – the What, the Why and the Where.

Circle Frame – Accuracy
Is the information consistent, accurate and adequate for our needs (to solve a problem or make a decision, for example)?

Square frame – Perspectives
We can look at information and a situation from different points of view, with different biases and prejudices.  Which ones are present?

Heart Frame – Interest
Focuses our attention on the relevant, salient, interesting information that matters most to you.

Diamond Frame – Value
How do we evaluate the value of our information?  We can use the six value medals to prioritise its importance.

Slab Frame – Conclusions
What does the information tell us and, crucially, what next?

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The Fertile Mind of Edward de Bono

The Green Hat Fits

Without a doubt, one of the most fertile minds in personal and management effectiveness of the late Twentieth Century is Edward de Bono.  His almost constant stream of books about thinking skills (approaching 60 to date – the latest is Think!: Before It’s Too Late) has provided insight, provocation, practical skills and frustrating verbiage by turns.  The fact is that I’m a sucker for his books and have 17 on my shelf.  Many have inspired me.

Green is One of Six

Perhaps de Bono’s two most famous titles are The Use of Lateral Thinking (1967 – and the several similar follow-up titles) and Six Thinking Hats(1985).

Edward de Bono's Six Thinking Hats

Six Thinking Hats is the one I frequently return to – both in my own thinking and in offering it as a valuable tool to workshop participants.  In a nutshell, de Bono advocates deploying different thinking modes to examine an issue, consider a decision or work on a problem from different points of view.

The Green Hat – Creativity

Put this on to think innovatively, creatively, and from a new perspective.

Yellow Hat – Positive

Put this on to think constructively, develop ideas, identify benefits and find practical ways to implement them.

Black Hat – Judgement

Put this on to evaluate risks, downsides and problems with an idea and evaluate it critically to protect us from mistakes.

White Hat – Factual

Put this on to focus on facts, evidence and logical analysis of the situation.

Red Hat – Feeling

Put this on for one of two reasons: to think intuitively and also to use your emotional response to generate and evaluate ideas.

Blue Hat – Process

Put this on to direct your team’s and your own thinking process; to provide an orderly structure for problem-solving, decision-making and evaluation, using all of the hats to see the topic in all possible ways.

The Thinking Hats Controversy

I don’t want to take sides: I don’t have a basis to do so.  But it is worth noting that Dr Michael Hewitt-Gleeson puts forward a case that the idea was developed not by de Bono, but by the directors of The Edward de Bono School of Thinking Inc – now defunct – but which Hewitt-Gleeson argues is the predecessor of his own School of Thinking.

What I do agree with Hewitt-Gleeson on is his rather lovely suggestion for a seventh hat.

The Grey Hat

Hewitt-Gleeson proposes a Grey Thinking Hat for Wisdom and I love the idea.  In his words:

Grey Hat Thinking is the ability to see consequences, immediate, short term and long term. It is the ability to look back over history and to see forward into the future. To understand cycles, passages of time, the passing of fashions, eras, eons and the many possible futures including extinction, the possibility of no future at all.

‘Grey Hat Thinking also means the wisdom to see other points of view. It includes the sagacity of patience to see beyond one’s own immediate viewpoint and the wisdom to see the viewpoints of others involved in situations: your partner’s viewpoint, your children’s, your children’s children, your neighbour’s, your customer’s, your enemy’s.’

From School of Thinking: Seventh Hat for Wisdom

Wisdom is a topic of great interest to me and, from now on, I intend to add The Grey Hat to my descriptions and credit it clearly.

Grey Thinking Hat of Wisdom

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Listening to your Customer

Steve Jobs famously eschewed focus groups and market research in designing new Apple products.  He did not want to supply what customers wanted.  He wanted customers to want what he created.

Whether Apple will be able to sustain that level of creativity is a question only time will answer.  But Jobs’ attitude did not mean that Apple was deaf to its customers – quite the opposite.  Having created the kind of loyalty that just about any other corporation can only dream of, everything Apple does has been tailored to retaining that crazy loyalty.

Marketing departments typically spend their time and resources looking for ever better ways to ensure that potential customers hear their message.  Customer service departments focus on fixing customer problems.  Who in your business is dedicated to listening to the customers you have, to build loyalty?  It’s cheaper and easier than acquiring new customers, and it’s cheaper and easier than fixing relationships with disappointed customers.

The big question is ‘How?’

How can you really listen to the voice of your customer? 

Surveys are great – especially low cost, easy-to-implement online surveys using tools like Zoomerang or Survey Monkey.  These have the benefit that they take little effort from your customer (and why should they make a big effort?) and can be supported by an appropriate incentive like a small reward or a competition entry.

The gold standard for good feedback on what you do (and don’t do) is follow-up calls or meetings from someone separate from the team that serves your customer.  To make it work for both you and your customer, you must welcome absolutely frank assessments and ask good questions to secure details that make appropriate actions easy to target accurately.

But what if your customers won’t talk to you?  You can always employ a ‘professional customer’ – mystery shoppers.  They are great for thorough, detailed and accurate assessment of what you do.  Unlike real customers, however, they cannot give you information about what else they want, from your product or service lines.

Customer focus groups or ‘customer panels’ can do that.  They are a lot of work to plan and organise and expensive too – often requiring specialist consultants, room hire, and inducements to participate.  This is a form of market research and the Marketing Pocketbook offers eight more variants on what we have above.

The forgotten question is Why?

In case ‘why would you listen to your customer?’ seems like a pointless question with an obvious answer: ‘of course you must’ – stop for a moment.

Of course you must, but unless you know why you are going to do it, you rune the risk of asking the wrong questions, choosing the wrong format, and mis-using the answers.  It is all too easy to feel like you are doing something useful by sending people out to listen to your customers, but before you do so, make sure you have a purpose and design the process accordingly.

A Paradigm Shift

Michael Porter identified two sources of competitive advantage:

  1. Industry Cost Leadership
  2. Product Differentiation

Arguably, Apple has neither, with high prices for products that are being successfully emulated by their main rivals.  So how are they succeeding?  I believe by a third source of competitive advantage: brand loyalty.

As a prevailing business strategy, this is new force in big business, but one we can all exploit, by building an organisation that excites and values its customers so much that we win the kind of fanatical following that Apple has.

If you can do that – with or without one of Porter’s two other sources of competitive advantage – you have the basis for a long-term business.

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David McClelland’s Three Motivational Needs

On a couple of occasions, the Management Pocketblog has referred to David McClelland’s theory of Motivational Needs.  The first time was in comparing it with Self Determination Theory, and the second was earlier this year, when we were thinking about job satisfaction.

In neither of these is the model fully explained – although you will find eight pages devoted to it in The Management Models Pocketbook and three in The Motivation Pocketbook – which is a veritable compendium of motivation theories.

Motivating me with McClelland’s Model

Let’s say you want to motivate me to take on a new role.  It can be any role, but let’s suppose you need someone from customer support to step into a sales role… which is not my preference and so I am not (yet) keen.

The first thing to note, is that I can never succeed without some decent training and support.  But I am not going to absorb that training and properly use the support unless you have motivated me to want to do the job.  So how can you present this as an opportunity for me to seize and savour?

McClelland suggested that we all have three needs, but that we each have them in different amounts.  If you can appeal to my strongest need, then I will take the opportunity to fulfil it.

David McClelland's Motivational Needs

The Need for Power

Suppose my strongest need is for power (evil Bond-villain laugh, while stroking a white cat).   You can present this new role as an opportunity for me to impress my peers, to stand out from them and to stand above them, by moving into a directly cash generating role.  It is a chance to show what I can do and get myself promoted.  If I do this role well, you might tell me, I will be looked up to and move into a sales management position from where I can control the sales process and lead a sales force.  The sales I make can create respect and generate bonuses that will enhance my prestige.

The Need for Achievement

If my strongest need is for achievement, I will see the trappings of power as appealing but superficial markers of success.  What really matters to me will be the sense that I have done something worthwhile and challenging.  You must assure me that the task I am taking on is difficult.  My need for achievement will not be satisfied by doing something easy.  But equally, i have to feel that I can achieve something, so you must also reassure me that the task is possible, if I work at it.  Set me targets and watch me meet them.  Reinforce my success by recognition and more stretching targets still.

The Need for Affiliation

If, however, my strongest need is for affiliation, nothing will matter much unless I feel a part of a group, a team, a social network,  So you must emphasise what a collaborative, social role sales is.  You must show me how I need to work as a team with colleagues from marketing, design, manufacturing… You would also do well to emphasise the social nature of selling; building relationships with customers and nurturing those relationships.  Show me how success means a strengthening of bonds and a joint celebration and yet how, in failure, we will all have a chance to learn together and collectively renew our commitment.

So here’s the Deal

McClelland gave us one of the best-researched models for workplace motivation – which is pretty reliable at predicting job satisfaction.  But any job can be framed and adjusted.  If you know the needs of your team – and you should be able to get to know them that well, as their manager – then you can use it to ensure all are motivated effectively.

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Clowns to the Left of Me, Jokers to the Right

Okay, so that’s no way to talk about your colleagues – although it does sometimes feel that way.  But the next line and the title of the 1974 Stealers Wheel song is ’stuck in the middle with you.’

Go on – click on the link – you know you want to waste four minutes and hear the song – just for old times’ sake!

Clowns&Jokers

Stuck in the Middle

The Latin word, mediare – to be in the middle – gives us our word mediate, which is a process of intervening between two parties to resolve a dispute.  More and more organisations are turning to mediators to help resolve internal disputes before moving to disciplinary or legal sanctions.

How does Mediation work?

There is a very thorough description of the mediation process on the website of the Oxford Centre for Higher Education Policy Studies (the catchily named OxCHEPS).  However, for most purposes, the process can be split into six steps, which form the basics of the process.  Different mediators and different contexts mean that there are a range of variations on this theme.

Step 1: Mediator meets person A (usually the person who has declared the grievance) and listens carefully to their point of view.  Mediator confirms with A that they are prepared to meet B.

Step 2: Mediator meets person B (in some cases the meeting starts with an agreement to pursue mediation – in others, that agreement will already have been given) and listens carefully to their point of view.  Mediator confirms with B that they are prepared to meet A.

Assuming both people have agreed to meet…

Photo: Steps in the Woods by Time Green Step 3: Mediator meets person A to share information and plan the meeting.

Step 4: Mediator meets person B to share information and plan the meeting.

Step 5: The mediator facilitates a meeting between A and B, at which they each listen to the other as they express their point of view.  The mediator ensures that all issues are shared and that each is listened to with care.  The mediator then helps A and B to explore their issues, and start to create an agreement.  When A and B reach an agreement, the mediator will document it and ask A and B to each sign the agreement and the mediator will witness it.

Step 6: In many cases, the mediator will agree a follow-up role, to monitor how the agreement is working.

The Discipline & Grievance Pocketbook

9781906610197[1]

The Discipline & Grievance Pocketbook has pragmatic information about this trickiest of workplace topics, from a seasoned HR professional, Ruth Sangale.  With mini case studies, checklists and standard letters, plus a handy set of step by step processes at the end, this is a must have for all managers and a handy reference for HR practitioners.

Whilst Ruth does not describe mediation in detail, she refers you to a free booklet from ACAS and the CIPD;‘Mediation – an Employer’s Guide’, which you can download by clicking on the link.

Other Management Pocketbooks you might enjoy

The Absence Management Pocketbook

The Induction Pocketbook

The Flexible Workplace Pocketbook

The Tackling Difficult Conversations Pocketbook

The Mediation Pocketbook

The Performance Management Pocketbook

The Employment Law Pocketbook

The Competencies Pocketbook

The Problem Behaviour Pocketbook

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Keep it SIMPLE

Regular readers will know that I am a sucker for acronyms – although I don’t always love them.  This one, I particularly like, and it comes from the heart of a change management and coaching process, called Solution Focus.

What the authors, Paul Z Jackson and Mark McKergow, offer is a change of focus from the problem to the solution.  A nice shift in perspective and one that chimes well with another interesting change management methodology, Appreciative Inquiry (AI).

SIMPLE

The acronym encompasses the authors’ attitudes nicely:

Solutions
– not problems

Inbetween
– the interaction between people is where to look

Make use of what’s there
– very much the AI approach

Possibilities
– look in the past, present and future

Language
– keep it simple (and ‘clean’?)

Every case is different
– so don’t try stock solutions

The Solution Focus

In an exceptional book, the authors take us through a set of tools that will help you move from the present towards a future you design following these six principles.  Another feature of the book is its introduction of the authors’ own coaching model, OSKAR Model.  This makes a feature of the importance of getting a perspective on the scale of the problem, which the GROW and its many variants do not explicitly include (although Sir John Whitmore certainly uses the principle.  Oskar was one of my ‘infinite number of coaching acronyms’ in an earlier blog.

Outcome
Scaling
Know How
Application
Review

So here’s the deal

If you are interested in either coaching or the management of change, and you are not familiar with The Solution Focus, it is a worthwhile read.  The authors offer a distinctive and insightful take on the change process at a personal and group level.

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It’s Time to Get Enabling

Last week, I was speculating that empowerment may create a social power base, to join others defined by John French and Bertram Raven.  I created my own definition of the word, by reading dictionaries, looking on the web and drinking tea:

‘a socially endorsed management process that
grants people genuine control and authority
within the work place’

That was a bit of a mouthful, so I turned to Mike Applegarth and Keith Posner’s excellent Empowerment Pocketbook for their definition:

‘Authority, Power, Licence.’

Far snappier than mine and the emphasis is theirs.  in fact, licence carries most of the burden of their definition.  They say that ‘to licence is to empower’.

The Empowerment Pocketbook

Another valuable point they make is that empowerment is a word managers use but rarely really explore.  My favourite definition comes from their introduction, not just because it makes the clear link with organisational culture, but because it tells us what empowerment really feels like, in the real world, and away from the book, journal or web page:

‘…the only culture where no one gets blamed,
is the one where it really empowers’

Some Nice Models

There are some nice adaptations of familiar models in the Empowerment Pocketbook.  They have adapted the Johari Window to team working and have a situational leadership model that places empowering as a leadership style that is high in two-way involvement and suitable for people high in responsibility and initiative.

I think the latter of the two is my favourite, so I will share it with you.

LeadershipStyles-Empowerment

Applegarth and Posner say:

‘Enabling the individual is an important step to achieving an empowered workforce, yet it is the one most often ignored.’

I think they are spot on with this.  Their toolkit for enabling the individual seems to me to be the heart of their Pocketbook and to provide some of the most practical content.

Too often empowerment is just a good word to bandy around.  if you are serious about it, though, it takes hard work and persistence.  The pay-off, however, can be huge.  Eventually, you will get better, more committed staff, who are able to work with less supervision, innovate beyond the means of their bosses, and delight your clients and customers.

It’s time to get enabling!

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Power Bases and Empowerment

I have always had a soft spot for John French and Bertram Raven’s model of Social Power Bases.  I am pretty certain in my recollection that this was the first management model I learned on my first management course as a new and eager management consultant fresh out of university.

Basic Consulting Skills was the course and, to my sorrow, I never found a slot for it in any of my consulting skills programmes.  Clients will insist on setting requirements that suit them, rather than indulge a trainer’s preferences*.

Social Power Bases

For those who are unfamiliar with the model (and who don’t have your copy of The Management Models Pocketbook to hand), let me recap, briefly.

French and Raven looked at the power within organisations.  They determined that all power originated from social interactions, rather than from the organisations themselves (as earlier researchers like Amitai Etzioni had theorised).

Their work led them to categorise these sources of social power into first five, then later seven power bases.  These are derived from the resources that the holder has at their disposal.

1. Legitimate Power – based on seniority of position

2. Reward Power – based on ability to offer inducements

3. Coercive Power – based on ability to impose sanctions

4. Expert Power – based on skills and expertise

5. Referent Power – based on personal characteristics; charisma

6. Information Power – based on the knowledge you can access

7. Connection Power – based on the people you can access

After French and Raven

This has proved a useful and enduring model, and so has attracted further research and speculation.  Later researchers and theorists have tinkered with names and definitions of the power bases and added more.  I think the strongest of these (which I included in my Pocketbook) is:

8. Resource Power – based on privileged access to valued resources

French and Ravens Social Power Bases

Empowerment

All of the above description is by way of a context to a new speculation.  It concerns one of the zeitgeist concepts of today: empowerment.  By reading dictionaries, looking on the web and drinking tea, I have come to a definition I think satisfactory for this word in the modern organisational context:

‘a socially endorsed management process that
grants people genuine control and authority
within the work place’

I do know that this is a bit of a mouthful.  First the granting of power must be led by more senior managers than the people granted the power.  Second, there is no power unless those people’s peers endorse it.  And third, the meaning of power must be about control and authority.

Empowerment as a Power Base

So here is my speculation.  If empowerment grants me power, then I have a power base.  I cannot make that power base fit neatly into my understanding of any of the eight established bases of power, that have been around since the 1950s.  So I am going to propose a new Social Power Base that, to my knowledge, has never been published before:

9. Empowered Power – based on socially endorsed organisational authority, granted by legitimate power

Management Pocketbooks you might like

The Empowerment Pocketbook

The Management Models Pocketbook (Chapter 8 covers power bases)

The Assertiveness Pocketbook

The Delegation Pocketbook


* Don’t worry, I have fitted it nicely into my ‘Three Hour MBA’ seminar.

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