Abstract: Empowerment is a powerful concept that is in danger of being debased by over-hyping. It is important to realize that empowerment is a slowly-created state of mind, rather than a verb – one does not “empower” by some magical, one-shot injection. The old, authoritarian, “macho” management attitudes are hard to dispel. Rather than overcoming them by exhortation, proposes a three-stage training framework. The general framework is that empowerment occurs as the organization sincerely “engages” with people and they progressively respond to this engagement. In operational terms, the scope of a person's job/task is progressively extended, leading to a growth in that person's personal capability. The first stage of this process is for the manager, as an enabler, to use people's current capability fully in their current job/task. In the second stage, the manager leads as a coaching enabler, extending people beyond their current capability, developing their full potential. Finally, the visionary enabler creates a broad climate of commitment in the organization through a sense of belonging and excitement in the job.
Author(s): John Nicholls Journal: Empowerment in Organizations ISSN: 0968-4891 Year: 1995 Volume: 3 Issue: 2 Page: 6 - 11 Publisher: MCB UP Ltd
