Benjamin wrote:
>In other words, I am powerful. No one gives me power. It is mine
>by the fact that I am an individual who is able to think and act
>in a rational (or if I wish, irrational way).
I think it was Doc who wrote that "empowerment still means giving
power" and I agree with him and that is the topic we are
discussing of.
Perhaps it is a question of different meanings of the same word,
but I think that empowerment is something that can be given or
pushed in organizations. It doesn?t matter to me how you call it,
but top managers can give or delegate more or less responsability
and authority to their people.
Something different is if you have the right person for a
predeterminated position. In my opinion, what Benjamin states is a
question of personal ability that can or cannot used in a company.
>Perhaps the real question here isn't so much about power to take
>action, as it is about how to distribute authority within an
>organization. Who is authorized to do what? Why are they
>uthorized? Authority usually follows position. Not everyone in an
>organization can have the authority to approve a budget or make a
>high-level management decision.
It is clear that authority must be distributed to make things work
correctly. But what empowerment facilitates, as I understand it,
is to have a more autonomus people in your organization and it is
something imposed by market forces:
* Competitive markets obligue you to offer the lowest prices, so
you must improve your productivity to obtain return. There is a
big pressure over costs.
* Most of the traditional structures in organizations are bigger
than really needed. In these structures are placed groups of
intermediate managers and internal staff which their main task is
to control the resources they manage: people, information and
others.
* But now, we have people trained / responsible enough and
information systems that allow line managers to have control over
their business without the support of others and they don?t need
an intermediate manager to control and push up information to top
managers. This new situation is cheaper and favours more complete
people.
* In this moment, is when techniques and tools of empowerment must
be applied, just to give support to these new managers who
increase resposability in their business.
Excuse me for being so long,
Jose Martin.
jose.huelves@grupobbv.com
--JOSE.HUELVES@GRUPOBBV.COM (MARTIN HUELVES, JOSE)
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