I found “five types of social power” meaningful because I can understand the reason why people get more power over others. In the examples on text book, person A has some sort of power over person B, and I have been person B for most of my life.
In my first blog, I talked about my supervisor at previous working place tried to use incentive as reward for extra work, and this reflects to the first type of social power, “reward power.” When my supervisor gave me incentives (reward), my motivation went up, but the productivity of mine fall when he stopped giving me rewards.
I haven’t experienced “coercive power” in the organization, but I think my mom had coercive power over me because I did homework in order to avoid punishments from her.
It is hard for me to define the difference between “referent power” and “expert power” since I easily get impressed when I see expert people. Probably, “referent power” doesn’t require specific knowledge, but leadership or good communication skill. On the other hand, “expert power” requires specific and detailed knowledge, but not charismatic people skill. Well, both of them would happen regardless of working status or positions.
In Japan, elder people tended to have “legitimate power” over younger people because elder people basically had higher positions than younger people in the Japanese traditional business organizations. Although some young people had great skills and knowledge, they were not able to democratically talk with elders. It’s because elder people had extreme “legitimate power.” Most Japanese organizations today have different style though.
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