“Power” and “Politics” are the words whenever taken together reminds people of terrible unwanted and bad things. “Power” refers to the ability or capacity of getting the work done from others which they would not do usually. “Politics” means the activities that occur with a motive to improve someone’s status and increasing power within an organization. Use of power and politics is meant to be for the betterment and increment of status and success in an organization, but, nowadays these terms are misunderstood as bad terms. Power and Politics are majorly associated with the errors of perceptions in an organization such as “Selective perception” and “Stereotyping”. Selective perception means to selectively infer some qualities of an individual and judge him/her on those perceived notions only. “Stereotyping” refers to the already established assumptions and perceptions related to a group of individuals, such as – it is usually believed that all Punjabi’s are foodies or all Muslims are from Pakistan.
In an organization these errors of perception often results in conflicts and biasness towards employees. Power in an organization is of various types such as – Reward power, Coercive power, legitimate power, Referent power, Expert power etc. Different types of powers are used in different situations in an organization. Power is not only exercised for the betterment, many power holders misuse the power for getting the work done that may not be right. Misusing the power in hands for unfavorable tasks in an organization often leads to the politics in an organization. Various strategies and tactics are used in politics to exercise the power in a bad way such as, divide and rule, manipulation, quick showing, avoid decisive engagement etc.
It is expected from an organization to use power in a good manner and create healthy environment in an organization to grow and succeed in future.
