Handbook of Principles of Organizational Behavior - Soltanieh ...

206 JAY A. CONGER AND CRAIG L. PEARCE
on the job could be lessened by their supervisor attributing such failures to external and
unstable factors (assuming there are valid reasons for doing so) such as task diffi culty, inadequate
support systems, and so forth, rather than attributing it to the individual ’s efforts or
abilities (Weiner, 1985 ). Employees, of course, must learn to take personal responsibility
for what they can control.
Stages 4 – 6
As a result of receiving the above forms of information, employees will interpret this
information according to their individual styles of assessment in stage 4. In other words,
personal interpretations will determine whether the information is seen as empowering
or not. Depressed individuals, for example, are less likely to see successes as indicative
of their own competence (Abramson, Seligman, and Teasdale, 1978 ). Others may have
irrational standards of perfection that in turn reduce perceptions of personal empowerment.
For these very reasons, careful selection of employees is necessary (see Chapters
1 – 3). In the next section where we discuss exceptions, we will describe this assessment
process in greater depth since it directly affects the success of any empowerment initiative.
If information is indeed interpreted as empowering, then the individual will enter a
state of psychological empowerment – and the behavioral effects of empowerment will
be noticed in stage five – followers becoming effective self - leaders (Manz and Sims, 1980 ).
Beyond the behavioral effects of empowerment on individuals are the effects on groups.
As individuals display effective self - leadership, the creation of shared leadership is the
logical next step (stage 6): According to Bligh et al. ( 2006 , p. 20), “ the development of
the self - leadership capabilities of team members sets into motion the meso - level processes
that result in higher collective - levels of trust, potency, and commitment, which in turn
facilitate the sustained sharing of mutual influence within the team that comprises shared
leadership. ”
EXCEPTIONS
We do not advocate empowerment as a new panacea for all organizational woes. Clearly,
there are limitations regarding the efficacy of empowerment. As Locke ( 2003 ) has indicated,
there are certain tasks which are the responsibility of the top leader. For example,
Locke ( 2003 , p. 278) noted that “ core values must be pushed from the top down. ” In fact,
we believe there are situations in which empowerment is actually harmful (e.g. it could
create anarchy with respect to core values). Further, empowerment could produce a
state of overconfidence and, in turn, misjudgments on the part of followers. Because of
a sense of false confidence in positive outcomes, employees might persist in efforts that, in
actuality, are tactical or strategic errors.
Similarly, followers might overextend themselves through tasks which are largely
imposs ible to accomplish. Leaders also might use such practices to garner commitment
to tasks which are unethical. The positive personal effects that are felt by followers during
empower ing experiences may blind them to the leader ’s own pragmatic (whatever works
for me today), non - value - driven agenda or the nefarious manipulation of others. (Self ­
interest is a good thing if it is tied to proper values.)