Handbook of Principles of Organizational Behavior - Soltanieh ...

11
Using Empowerment to Motivate
People to Engage in Effective
Self - and Shared Leadership
JAY A. CONGER AND CRAIG L. PEARCE
In recent decades there has been a steady increase in interest in empowerment as a motivational
tool in both the academic (e.g. Conger and Kanungo, 1988 ; Houghton, Neck,
and Manz, 2003 ; Liden and Arad, 1995 ; Mills and Ungson, 2003 ; Pearce and Sims,
2002 ; Thomas and Velthouse, 1990 ) and practitioner literature (e.g. Block, 1987 ; Conger,
1989 ; Manz and Sims, 1989 , 2001 ; Pearce, 2008 ). The essence of empowerment, at the
individual level of analysis, entails granting autonomy to individuals to perform tasks,
while simultaneously enhancing their task - related self - efficacy (Bandura, 1986 , 1997 ; see
also Chapter 10 ). Naturally, empowerment needs to be founded on appropriately set goals
(Locke and Latham, 1990 ; see also Chapter 9 ).
At the individual level of analysis, empowerment is ultimately experienced when followers
engage in effective self - leadership (Manz and Sims, 1980 ; Houghton et al., 2003 ),
where self - leadership is defi ned as “ a process through which people infl uence themselves to
achieve the self - direction and self - motivation needed to perform ” (Houghton et al., 2003 ,
p. 126). The empirical evidence on empowerment suggests that it has a powerful positive
influence on individuals (e.g. Liden, Wayne, and Sparrowe, 2000 ; Spreitzer, 1995 ; Spreitzer,
Kizilos, and Nason, 1994 ).
As we move to the group level of analysis, empowerment is experienced when the group
effectively practices shared leadership (Pearce and Conger, 2003 ; Pearce, 2004 , 2008 ),
where shared leadership is defined as “ a dynamic, interactive influence process among
individuals in groups for which the objective is to lead one another to the achievement of
group or organizational goals or both ” (Pearce and Conger, 2003 , p. 1). Here again, the
empirical evidence is fairly robust regarding the positive influence of empowerment (e.g.
Ensley, Hmieleski, and Pearce, 2006 ; Pearce and Sims, 2002 ; Pearce, Yoo, and Alavi, 2004 ).
In the next section we explore the complex process of empowerment.