Subordinates’ influencing tactics

Susan Geertshuis (UoA), Helena Cooper-Thomas (UoA) and Rachel Morrison (AUT)

August 2009

Influence at work• Social influence derives from power. Reward, coercive, expert, legitimate, referent

(French and Raven, 1959).

• Subordinates may have to make the most of what power they’ve got

  

Subordinates’ Tactics

• Ingratiation, rationality, exchange, coalitions, upward appeal and assertiveness (after Kipnis, Schmidt and colleagues).

  

Rationality – the literature

Higher performers use rationality more

Politically skilled subordinates use rationality more

Ingratiation – the literature

• Politically skilled • Socially oriented

What determines whether and which tactics are used?

Is it that influencing is just another example of a proactive work behaviour?

e.g. “If I believe in an idea no obstacle will prevent me from making it happen”

...and do you seek to influence to the extent that you believe your intervention will result in the outcome you want?

Hypotheses• More proactive participants will report using

influence tactics more• Participants higher on role breadth efficacy will

adopt influencing tactics, particularly rationality, more than will participants low on RBSE– e.g. Level of confidence in “Designing new

procedures for your work area”

• Participants higher on control appraisal will adopt influencing tactics more... or will they?– e.g. “With many of the problems I experience, it is

not worth telling anyone because nothing will change”

Participants • Adults who work 15 or more hours a week. They

were enrolled in continuing education courses at the University of Auckland. Data were gathered using an online questionnaire between February and June 2009.

• N=182, 84% female and half had been in their role for over 3 years, 40% over 50 years old, 80% were educated to degree level.

• Line managers 45% female

Results

Mean Std. Deviation

Rationality 3.89 .88Ingratiation 2.64 .99Coalition 2.23 .88Upward appeal 1.68 .90Exchange 1.50 .65Assertiveness 1.45 .66

(Scored on a 1 to 5 scale with high scores indicating more frequent use)

Results

Proactive personality

Control appraisal

Role breadth self efficacy

Proactive personalityalpha = .78

Control appraisal.109 alpha =.79

Role breadth self efficacy .373** .293** alpha =.90

ResultsAll tactics Ingratiation Rationality Exchange Upward

AppealCoalition Assertiveness

Step 1TenureAgeEducationR2Step 2Proactive Personality

RBSEControl appraisal

Change R2

Hierarchical regression

Tenure, age and education at step 1.

Proactive personality, role breadth self efficacy and control appraisal at step 2

Repeated for each tactic

All tactics

Step 1

Tenure -.15

Age -.10

Education -.07

R2 .04*

Step 2

Proactive Personality

.03

RBSE .17 *

Control appraisal

-.22 **

Change R2 .13 *

..so increased overall tactic use associated with low control and high RBSE

All tactics Ingratiation Rationality Assertiveness

Step 1

Tenure -.12 -.08 -.16 .04

Age -.12 -.21 ** -.00 .01

Education -.07 .04 .04 -.17 *

R2 .04 .07 ** .03 .03

Step 2

Proactive Personality

.07 .01 -.04 .08

RBSE .20 * .11 .26 ** .08

Control appraisal

-.24 ** -.29** -.03 -.30 **

Change R2 .06* .08 ** .06** .09**

...so not all tactics are equal.

RBSE predicts rationality

Control (or lack of it) predicts ingratiation and assertiveness

Hypotheses

• More proactive participants will report using influence tactics more

• Participants higher on role breadth efficacy will adopt influencing tactics, particularly rationality, more than will participants low on RBSE

• Participants higher on control appraisal will adopt influencing tactics more

Rationality

High efficacy participants reported using Rationality more

Control appraisal moderated the effect of efficacy

Ingratiation and Assertiveness

• A response to lack of power? • A locus of control explanation?

The adoption of some tactics may reflect helplessness not power.

Next steps

• Study 2 - Managers’ perspective• Study 3 - Training

Researching how you influence the boss

• Questions,• Advice, especially advice!