Critically evaluate Chris Smalls’ leadership
style and how he approaches power and
politics at Amazon Labour Union .
Student number:W10230003
Word count: 1304
This essay will thoroughly examine Chris Small's approach to power and politics
while assessing his leadership style within the Amazon Labour Union. Chris
Small's leadership style overlapped with the transformational, charismatic, and
servant leadership styles at the beginning of his rise to power, then shifted toward a
slightly more narcissistic way of leading at the peak of his fame. First, this essay
will focus on Chris Small’s leadership style; then, we will discuss Chris Smalls’s
perspective on power and politics.
Chris Smalls was a transformational leader in his day before the ALU in Amazon’s
JFK8 warehouse, where he led his small team to exceed the hourly “picked” items
quota from 250 to 400 items per hour. This demonstrates that one of the
dimensional traits of the transformational leadership style, as defined by (Bass,
1985) is inspirational motivation, where the leader motivates, inspire, and
‘challenge followers with high standards, communicate optimism about future goal
attainment’ (Judge & Piccolo, 2004, p.755). By setting out a goal of exceeding the
company’s quota, Chris Smalls created the desire to achieve and motivate the
team. This correlates to the satisfaction theory: “For any given trial, exceeding the
goal increases satisfaction” (Locke & Latham, 2002, p.709). Despite these goals
being met and surpassed, Small still failed to get promoted due to Amazon's
business model relying on the high turnover rate of low-skilled labor work.
However, after Chris Small's failed attempt to get the managerial promotion and
the creation of the Amazon Labor Union, Chris Smalls began to overlap between
leadership styles. Chris Smalls’s leadership style evolved as he became the face of
ALU and a servant leader. Servant leaders are defined by their high devotion to
ensuring their followers. “Highest priority needs are served first” (Greenleaf, 2002,
p. 4). Chris Smalls would set up a campaign ground facing the JFK8 warehouse
and serve food, play music, call taxis for exhausted employees, and even give them
marijuana. By doing this, Chris Smalls became closer to the followers and helped
him get more people to help unionize Amazon. Chris Smalls would also use his
notoriety to help get eyes on the union strike through media coverage, creating
value for the community and a positive contribution to society (Barbuto &
Wheeler, 2006). Moreover, of course, by unionizing Amazon, Chris Smalls is
helping a fight for employees' rights, making Amazon create fairer treatment and a
better working environment. This again highlights Greenleaf's statement that
servant leaders are firmly committed to their people's well-being. This method of
leading tremendously helped Chris Smalls gain more followers and build a more
interpersonal relationship with them, according to (Bedi & Green, 2015), which in
turn helped him and the ALU grow.
However, Chris Smalls, front and foremost, is a highly charismatic leader with his
so-called “Union Drip.” According to House and Podsakoff (1994), charismatic
leaders can radiate confidence and are seen by their followers to have extraordinary
talent and quality. Chris Smalls covers himself with gold chains, diamond earrings,
and high-fashion clothing, showing his confidence. Not only does it help bring
more appeal to the anti-blue collard workers today generation to the cause, but it
also emphasizes the belief that working 40 hours a week earns you at least enough
money to pay your rent and still have some to spare for jewelry and other
expenses. Even though the superficial charm helped Chris Smalls become more
famous, it also made him infamous among his followers. This made Chris Smalls
more of a celebrity and less of a worker, distancing him from his followers.
Being a very charismatic leader, Chris Smalls does show signs of being a toxic and
narcissistic leader. According to Sankowsky (1995), leaders with good intentions
could also abuse their power. This occurs when a leader acts in a manner that
manipulates an area of control for personal gain at the follower's expense. In the
study, Chris Smalls knowingly used the money donated to the union to help the
workers pay for his expenses. Even though there could be an argument that Chris
Smalls was unemployed with no cash income and that there would be no union
without Chris Smalls, this is still an abuse of power. Chris Smalls used that money
as a charity account user to help himself without his followers’ knowledge.
Thomas's (2010) research on narcissistic behavior in leaders shows that these types
of leaders are often arrogant and over-confident, which Chris Small showcased in
many situations, such as not listening to his followers, not helping other union
leaders, refusing help from other more experienced union leaders such as
McAlvey. This publicizing of narcissistic behavior can decrease the number of
people supporting the cause. According to Sutton (2007), promoting harmful
practices can also harm an organization's capacity to draw competent personnel.
Not only that, Chris Smalls also showed toxic behavior, like berating an organizer
because she asked for help. This has created a massive gap between Chris Smalls
and his followers. In contrast to before, when Chris Smalls was seen as a fellow
worker helping others fight the giant mega-corporation, Chris Smalls has now
become very distanced from them. These gaps resulted in infighting inside the
organization and untrust between the followers and Chris Smalls. Chris Small's
leadership style showcases how toxic and narcissistic leadership could heavily
impact an organization's operations. Research from (Mitchell and Ambrose, 2007,
and Duffy et al., 2002) found that subordinates who work under a toxic leader
could cause counter-productive behavior in the workplace.
Next, we will evaluate Smalls's approach to power and politics in his organization.
As a labor union, the ALU is often vital to the pluralistic approach to industrial
relations. As defined by Swanepoel (2005), the pluralist perspective considers the
employing organization as a combination of persons and groups with varied
purposes. The basic assumption with this perspective is that individuals in an
organization combine into several separate groups, each having its own interests,
aims, and leadership. Unions are often a central component of this approach, which
seeks to balance power between leadership and employees. The pluralist industrial
relations paradigm emphasizes the importance of balancing property rights and
labor rights. It seeks to strike a balance between efficiency, equity, and voice. ,
Chris Smalls' beliefs and actions align with a pluralist approach to worker
representation and empowerment (Harvard University, n.d.). He recognizes the
importance of diverse perspectives and experiences and seeks to incorporate these
into collective action and solidarity. By emphasizing the power of workers coming
together to demand change, Smalls is advocating for a more inclusive and
democratic approach to worker representation and advocacy. His success in
organizing workers at Amazon and raising awareness of worker issues suggests
that this pluralist approach can effectively promote worker rights and
representation.
As a very charismatic leader, Smalls often uses referent power, a “person’s ability
to influence others’ behavior because they like, admire, and respect the individual”
(Lunenburg F.C, 2012). Smalls is often seen as a “leader who inspired awe and
trust,” even making his fellow workers want to impress him, affirming the theory
that referent power can make you willingly change your choice (Craig & Douglas,
2006)
Small's use of referent power showcases his ability to influence others through
personal qualities and relationships and emphasizes the multifaceted nature of
power dynamics within organizations. His success in wielding referent power
underscores the significance of interpersonal skills, charisma, and trust in
leadership and influence and highlights the value of personal sources of power that
go beyond formal authority.
In conclusion, Chris Small's leadership style evolved from transformational to
servant and charismatic but showed signs of toxicity and narcissism. His approach
to power and politics aligns with a pluralist perspective, emphasizing the
importance of worker representation and empowerment. Small's success in
organizing workers at Amazon highlights the significance of interpersonal skills
and personal sources of power in leadership and influence.
References
Reference list
Barbuto, J.E. and Wheeler, D.W. (2006) Scale Development and Construct Clarification of
Servant Leadership. Group & Organization Management [online]. 31 (3), pp. 300–326.
Bass, B. (1985) Leadership and Performance beyond Expectations. New York, Free Press.
Bedi, A., Alpaslan, C.M. and Green, S. (2015) A Meta-analytic Review of Ethical Leadership
Outcomes and Moderators. Journal of Business Ethics [online]. 139 (3), pp. 517–536. [Accessed
10 February 2020].
C Samuel Craig and Douglas, S.P. (2005) International Marketing Research. Chichester, Wiley.
Duffy, M.K., Ganster, D.C. and Pagon, M. (2002) Social Undermining in the Workplace.
Academy of Management Journal [online]. 45 (2), pp. 331–351.
Erasmus, B. and Swanepoel (2005) South African Human Resource Management for the Public
Sector. Cape Town, Juta Academic.
Greenleaf, R.K. (2002) Servant leadership: a Journey into the Nature of Legitimate Power and
Greatness. New York, Paulist Press.
Harvard University (2020) From Diversity to Pluralism pluralism.org [online]. Available from:
https://pluralism.org/from-diversity-to-pluralism.[Accesed 1st December 2023]
House, R.J., Podsakoff, P.M. and Management, I. (1994) Leadership Effectiveness : past
Perspectives and Future Directions for Research. Philadelphia, Pa., Wharton School, Sei Center
For Advanced Studies In Management.
Judge, T.A. and Piccolo, R.F. (2004) Transformational and Transactional Leadership: a MetaAnalytic Test of Their Relative Validity. Journal of Applied Psychology [online]. 89 (5), pp.
755–768.
Locke, E.A. and Latham, G.P. (2002) Building a Practically Useful Theory of Goal Setting and
Task motivation: a 35-year odyssey. American Psychologist [online]. 57 (9), pp. 705–717.
Lunenburg, F.C., 2012. Power and leadership: An influence process. International journal of
management, business, and administration, 15(1), pp.1-9.
Mitchell, M.S. and Ambrose, M.L. (2007) Abusive Supervision and Workplace Deviance and the
Moderating Effects of Negative Reciprocity beliefs. Journal of Applied Psychology [online]. 92
(4), pp. 1159–1168. Available from:
https://media.terry.uga.edu/socrates/publications/2013/05/Mitchell__Ambrose_2007_Abusive_s
upervision_and_deviance_JAP.pdf [Accessed 25 August 2019].
Sankowsky, D. (1995) The Charismatic Leader as narcissist: Understanding the Abuse of Power.
Organizational Dynamics [online]. 23 (4), pp. 57–71. [Accessed 2 October 2019].
Sutton, R.I. (2007) The No Asshole Rule. Business Plus.
Thomas, D. (2010) Narcissism : behind the Mask. Sussex, Book Guild.