Jawn Lam

Jeffrey Pfeffer

ThinkersBorn 1946Organizational theorist

Works

  • Who Gets Power, and How They Hold On to It: A Strategic-Contingency Model of Power, Organizational Dynamics, 1977
  • The External Control of Organizations: A Resource Dependence Perspective, 1978
  • Power in Organizations, 1981
  • Managing with Power: Politics and Influence in Organizations, 1992
  • Power: Why Some People Have It and Others Don't, 2010

In Tactics of Organizational Politics

Ideas

Resource dependence. Organizations depend on others for the resources they need, and whoever controls a critical, scarce resource gains power over those who depend on it. Organizations and the people in them act to manage those dependencies, by reducing their own and creating others'.

Power as structural position. Pfeffer treats organizations as political systems in which important decisions are shaped by power as well as by analysis. Power comes largely from position in the structure: control of resources, information, and the decision process, and centrality in networks of dependence.

Managing with power. Getting things done in organizations requires diagnosing who has power, where it comes from, and whose support is needed, then building and using power deliberately. Pfeffer argues that managers need to learn these skills to get their decisions carried out.

Strategic contingencies. Power inside an organization goes to the subunits and people who can cope with its critical problems, so a legal department gains power when the company faces lawsuits. Once held, power tends to be institutionalized, as its holders shape structures and rules that keep it in place after the problems change.

Timing, analysis, and structure as tools of power. The book's later chapters treat the tactics of power: acting first lets you set a position others must accommodate, and delay, often by calling for further study, is one of the best ways to stop something (chapter 12); information and analysis are used selectively in political contests (chapter 13); and changing the structure can consolidate power by putting allies in control of resources and information (chapter 14). Representation on important task forces and committees is treated as a sign of a unit's power (chapter 3).

Building a personal power base. Pfeffer's 2010 book, written for a general business audience, advises choosing where to start with care, often in a powerful unit; standing out, including by asking powerful people for help and advice; and building a reputation that makes others prefer supporting you to opposing you.

What it explains

Pfeffer's work is the most direct account in the literature of how decisions are actually won inside organizations: through control of resources, information, and process, and through allies. It treats organizational politics as a normal part of management that can be studied and practiced.

Tactics that draw on Jeffrey Pfeffer (116)

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