Leadership and Leading: Analysis of Power, Politics, and Conflict in Unilever

Leadership & Leading

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................3
Academic analysis...........................................................................................................................3
Power......................................................................................................................................3
Politics....................................................................................................................................5
Conflict...................................................................................................................................6
Reflective statement.........................................................................................................................7
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................9
REFERENCES:.............................................................................................................................10
Books and Journals...............................................................................................................10
Online...................................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Leadership is a very important part of the organisations that helps in directing the
functions and the activities towards the achievement of the goal. Effective leaders plays an vital
role in achieving the goal of the organisations as they keep on motivating and encouraging the
employees (Lytle and et.al., 2018). This facilitates the organisations to enhance their
communication process through which they can easily co-ordinate with the each other. For this
report, Unilever has been taken into account. Unilever is an British multinational consumer
goods company that was founded in 1929 by the Lever Brother. Company mainly deals in three
segments that are foods and refreshments, beauty care and home care. They provides various
types of products to their customers like tea, coffee, pet food, ice cream etc. They are one of the
well established brand that is present across the globe. In this report there will be the discussion
on the concept power in relation to the leadership and the business. Machiavelli’s The Prince and
French and Raven’s 6 Bases of Power theory will be analysed top better understands the concept
of power. Along with that, there will be the evaluation of the concept politics in relation to the
Michael Jarrett model. Nature and impact of the conflicts will also be taken in relation to the
organisation. At last of this report, reflective statements will be discussed.
MAIN BODY
Academic analysis
It is an important part of the organisation that helps the reader to better understands the
ideas and work of the company (Shaw-VanBuskirk, Lim, and Jeong, 2019). This analysis is done
in the companies to create or develop a point of view of the reader that helps the company in the
future to make necessary changes. This analysis involves mainly three concepts that are power,
politics and conflicts. Academic analysis in relation to the Unilever is as follows:
Power
Power in the leadership can be defined as leaders have the power on their employees to
Lead the actions towards the goal of the organisation (Kiss, Simpson and Smith, 2020). It can
also be referred as the way to influence the nature and behaviour of the others through various
techniques that helps in the achievement of the particular goal or objective of the organisation.
Power in the business can be termed as the manager has the controlled over the employees of the

business in order to manage all the important activities. This concept is very important for the
leaders and the managers as with the power they got authority also which helps them to exercise
the power.
Machiavelli’s The Prince theory
This theory was given by Niccolo Machiavelli. This principle describes that the how the
leaders in the company should gain the power in order to lead the actions of the employees
towards the goal of the organisation. This theory focuses on to create a state in which the
functions of the leadership can be carried out (Patton, 2021). It is very important theory that
gives the practical experience of leadership to a particular individual in the company. This theory
ensures that the leader should understands the public as well as the private morals in order to
smoothly run the operations in the company. Unilever leaders ensures that they should not only
have to increase the reputation of the company but they also take necessary actions if the
unethical work is being done by any employees.
French and Raven’s 6 Bases of Power
This model was given in John R.P. French and Bertram Raven in 1959. This model
consists various types of powers that are coercive, reward, legitimate, referent and expert. French
and Raven’s 6 Bases of Power in relation to the Unilever is as follows:
 Coercive power: This power means that to force the employees to do the task without
their consent. This power is usually carries out by the leaders in the case when employees
does not follow the rules on the company.
 Reward power: This power means when the leaders of the companies give rewards and
benefits to the employee when employees carries out the work by achieving compliance
(Antonacopoulou and Georgiadou, 2021). Unilever leaders practices this power as this
helps in motivating the employees in the company.
 Legitimate power: This type of power comes with the position that one have in the
company. Unilever leaders have the legitimate power as they when the company elected
the leaders they are given the power to lead the operations of the company.
 Expert power: This type of power is generally practices by those people who have skill,
competence and experience in some field (Keim and Shadnam, 2020). This gives them
the power to influence the employees in the company.