Michael Noreman

The article that I examined was titled, “When Power Makes Others Speechless: The Negative Impact of Leader Power on Team Performance”, written by Leigh Plunkett Tost, Francesca Gino, and Richard P. Larrick. The main question this article addressed was whether a leader’s heightened power within a group dynamic led the leader to dominating discussions within meetings within groups. This is a particularly interesting subject since organizations make extensive use of teams on a daily basis. In order for a team to function correctly, the dynamic between the leader and the rest of the team must be positive, or else the team will not function correctly. If leaders and teams do not function correctly this will make the business less efficient resulting in lower profits for the firm. It is for this bottom line reason that organizations must make effective teams. The article lists several hypothesis regarding team dynamics and power of leaders. I have chosen a select hypothesis to highlight that which most closely relates to the theme of the article. The first hypothesis states, “Formal leaders with a high subjective sense of power spend more time talking in a meeting then formal leaders with a neutral sense of power”. What this means is that leaders who feel extremely powerful and important are more likely to dominate discussion within a team than leaders who do not feel a significant sense of power. This seems to be mainly an issue with ego. If the leader has a big ego he/she may seek to control meetings with teams. The way this hypothesis was tested was through an experiment involving teams. The teams were instructed to solve problems through collaboration. The level of power of the leaders of these teams was manipulated by the administers of the test. MBA students were the subject of the test. I believe this makes a difference because students