A CLASSROOM EXERCISE DEMONSTRATING THE IMPACT OF STRUCTURAL AND PSYCHOLOGICAL EMPOWERMENT

Empowerment, Leadership, Management

Employee empowerment yields important positive outcomes for employees, managers, and organizations. Yet too many employees feel disempowered at work, and their managers, while wanting to empower their employees, often do not know how. It has not helped matters, that research on empowerment has been dichotomized between a structural and a psychological perspective. In this session, we integrate the structural and psychological empowerment perspectives and introduce a classroom exercise that teaches students how to foster empowerment at work. Drawing upon experiential learning theory, this exercise simulates an airplane manufacturing organization and provides teachers with an important classroom tool to instruct students about the importance of empowerment, trust, and performance in organizational life.