Organizational change: The effects of power and change impact on framing bias, risky decisions and subsequent communication

Abstract

Drury¿s dissertation proposal looks at the effects of framing and power on decision making and the communicated justifications regarding decisions. It includes two experiments focusing on both top-down change where high power holders are not impacted by the organizational change but low power holders are and bottom-up change where both high and low power holders are eligible for experiencing consequences from the change. The goal is to explore the effects of power and potential for experiencing consequences (direct impacts) from change on one¿s preference for risk, one¿s decision making, and one¿s justification for said decisions. In this project, power is defined as a structural position (Ng, 1980) with authority (French & Raven, 1959; Morley, Moore, Heraty, & Gunnigle, 1998) and power to withhold resources, which maintains power-holders¿ control and authority (Keltner, Gruenfeld, & Anderson, 2003). Hypotheses explore what happens when high power holders have structural, legitimate authority and both high and low power holders are either at risk for impacts from the change or not. The first experiment will explore a budget reduction change situation similar to downsizing. Scenarios describe a situation similar to the television series, ¿The Apprentice,¿ where teams complete a project and the losing team sends members into the boardroom to be fired. Participants will be in either a bottom-up or top-down change (meaning they may be at risk for being fired or not) with more or less power and in a gain or loss frame (2x2x2 cell design). They will be asked to offer justifications after their decision.