Elsevier

The Leadership Quarterly

Volume 19, Issue 5, October 2008, Pages 609-621
The Leadership Quarterly

Validation of the extended Influence Behavior Questionnaire

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.leaqua.2008.07.006Get rights and content

Abstract

We conducted four studies to evaluate the extended version of the Influence Behavior Questionnaire (IBQ), which measures proactive tactics used to influence people in organizations. The results provide support for the reliability and validity of the 11 tactic scales in the newest version of the IBQ. The questionnaire has widespread potential applications for both research and practice, and it is the most comprehensive and best validated measure of proactive influence tactics. However, the IBQ is not equally useful for all purposes, and we describe some limitations and potential problems that could reduce the validity of the scales.

Introduction

Influence is essential for effective performance by managers. To be effective a manager must influence others to carry out requests, support proposals, and implement decisions. The success of an attempt by one person (the “agent”) to influence another person (“the target”) depends to a great extent on the influence tactics used by the agent. Influence tactics can be classified according to their primary purpose and time frame. Proactive tactics are used in an attempt to influence someone to carry out an immediate request, and they are especially important in situations where the agent has little authority over target persons. Impression management tactics are used to create a favorable image and build a better relationship (e.g., Gardner and Martinko, 1988, Kumar and Beyerlein, 1991, Wayne and Ferris, 1990). Political tactics are used to influence policy decisions or the allocation of scarce resources (Kacmar and Baron, 1999, Pfeffer, 1992). Some types of influence tactics can be used for more than one purpose, but a tactic may not be equally effective for different purposes (Yukl & Chavez, 2002).

Influence behavior can be studied with several research methods, including coding of qualitative descriptions of influence behavior (e.g., from critical incidents or diaries), manipulation of influence tactics in laboratory experiments (e.g., with actors, role play exercises, or scenarios), and manipulation of influence behavior in field experiments (e.g., with feedback and training). The method used most often to study proactive influence tactics is a behavior description questionnaire. Since 1980 two different questionnaires were developed for survey research on proactive influence tactics.

Kipnis, Schmidt & Wilkinson (1980) collected critical incidents that described successful and unsuccessful influence attempts by the respondents. The researchers analyzed these critical incidents to identify distinct influence tactics. Based on their findings the researchers developed an agent self-report questionnaire called the POIS to measure eight influence tactics. Schriesheim & Hinkin (1990) later conducted a factor analysis of the POIS using data from respondents who indicated how often they used each type of tactic in upward influence attempts with their boss. This study found support for six of the proposed tactics (i.e., rationality, exchange, ingratiation, assertiveness, coalition, and upward appeal), but not for the remaining two tactics (blocking and sanctions). The revised agent POIS with six tactic scales and three items per scale was tested in a subsequent study of upward influence (Hochwarter, Harrison, Ferris, Perrewe & Ralston, 2000). The results provided only limited support for the tactic scales. Scale reliabilities were low for some samples, and some of the fit statistics for the confirmatory factor analysis were outside the acceptable range.

Both the original and revised versions of the agent POIS have been used in many studies on the determinants and consequences of proactive tactics used to influence bosses (e.g., Deluga, 1988, Deluga, 1991, Schmidt and Kipnis, 1984, Thacker and Wayne, 1995, Wayne et al., 1997). Only a few studies (e.g., Erez and Rim, 1982, Kipnis et al., 1980) have used the POIS to measure influence behavior directed at subordinates or peers, and there is no systematic validation evidence for this use of the tactic scales. Another limitation of the POIS is that self reports of behavior are usually not as accurate as ratings of a person's behavior by other people. Finally, the POIS does not include scales to measure some tactics likely to be important for managers and professionals. A more accurate and comprehensive questionnaire was needed for research on interpersonal influence in organizations.

Unlike the POIS, the IBQ was developed as a target questionnaire. A respondent rates how often a designated agent (e.g., the boss or a peer) uses examples of each proactive tactic in attempts to influence the respondent. The early version of the IBQ included scales for six tactics that are similar to ones in the POIS (i.e., rational persuasion, exchange, ingratiation, pressure, coalition, and upward appeals), but new items were developed for these scales rather than merely revising items from the POIS. In addition, the IBQ included scales to measure four proactive tactics based on the leadership and power literature (i.e., consultation, inspirational appeals, personal appeals, and legitimating). Early validation research provided support for nine of the ten tactics (Yukl, Lepsinger & Lucia, 1992). The factor analysis for target subordinates and peers indicated that there was not sufficient justification for a separate scale on upward appeals, because they were viewed as just another form of coalition tactic. Research with critical incidents provided evidence from an entirely different method that the remaining nine tactics are distinct and meaningful for managers and professionals in business organizations (Falbe and Yukl, 1992, Yukl et al., 1996). The early version of the target IBQ was used in several studies on antecedents and consequences of proactive tactics (e.g., Barbuto and Scholl, 1999, Gravenhorst and Boonstra, 1998, Douglas and Gardner, 2004, Sparrowe et al., 2006, Yukl and Falbe, 1990, Yukl and Tracey, 1992).

Several years ago the IBQ was revised and extended to include two additional tactics (Yukl & Seifert, 2002). The 11 proactive tactics in the extended IBQ are listed and defined in Table 1. This version of the questionnaire (called the IBQ-R) used the same approach for ordering items as in the earlier IBQ. The order of items was essentially random, and the only constraint was to have each tactic represented equally in the initial, middle, and final parts of the questionnaire.

Two methods were used to select items for scales in the IBQ-R. To assess whether an item is perceived to be a relevant example of the tactic it was intended to measure, 20 doctoral students read definitions of the tactics and coded each item according to the primary type of tactic it represented. The coders could indicate if an item fit two or more tactics equally well, or if the item did not fit any of the tactics very well. The order of items in the coding task was randomized. An item was retained for a tactic scale only if at least 75% of the coders accurately classified it, and for most items the coding accuracy exceeded 80%.

The other method for item selection was an exploratory factor analysis, which was conducted for a sample of target managers in several companies who rated the influence behavior of a boss, peer, or subordinate (Yukl & Seifert, 2002). The analysis (using principal components, orthogonal rotation, and eigenvalues greater than 1.0) indicated support for the 11 tactics. Items with high loadings on their intended factor and low loadings on other factors were selected for the IBQ-R, and at least four items were selected for each scale.

Additional evidence for the construct validity of the 11 tactics is provided by a few studies that used the extended IBQ-R (e.g., Charbonneau, 2004, Yukl et al., 2005), and by research using incident diaries (Yukl et al., 2005) or scenarios (Yukl, Fu & McDonald, 2003). However, evidence that constructs are meaningful and distinct does not indicate how accurately each construct is measured by a particular questionnaire. The purpose of this article is to report the results of research on the reliability and validity of the 11 tactic scales in the extended versions of the questionnaire, with special emphasis on the IBQ-G.

The IBQ-R is useful for a longitudinal study in which a researcher wants to minimize any effects of the initial survey on respondent ratings in subsequent surveys. However, for most research on influence tactics, grouping items into tactic scales makes the questionnaire easier for respondents to use and helps respondents to differentiate among the tactics. Since rational persuasion is the most common tactic, the scale for it was placed first in the questionnaire, and the order of the remaining scales alternates between more and less effective tactics. A comprehensive study of possible order effects was not carried out, but varying the order of the tactic scales somewhat in the early studies did not appear to have any obvious effects on respondents. The IBQ-G shown in Appendix A is the one used most often in the validation studies conducted during the past few years.

Each tactic scale in the IBQ-G has 4 items. The content of the items reflects findings in descriptive research on common influence objectives and the tactics used for each type of objective (Yukl et al., 1993, Yukl et al., 1995). The objectives in the IBQ items include attempts to influence the target person to comply with an unspecified request, to carry out a task, to provide assistance, to support or implement a proposed change, or to do a personal favor for the agent. Most items are general rather than very specific to make them widely relevant for studying influence behavior in organizations. The IBQ does not include examples of tactics that are clearly unethical (e.g., lying, distortion of evidence, bribes, blackmail).

Each item has five anchored response choices indicating how often the agent uses the tactic to influence the target respondent. The scale score for a tactic is the mean of the item scores, and the range of possible mean scores for a tactic is from 1 to 5. The instructions and response choices for the IBQ-G are shown in the Appendix A. Most questionnaires with a frequency response format use “never” as the least frequent response choice, but the IBQ uses a response choice that many raters find more acceptable (“I can't remember him/her ever using this tactic with me”). Because items were selected to be potentially relevant forms of influence for any manager or professional in an organization, a “don't know or not applicable” response choice is not provided. Extensive use of the IBQ in feedback workshops for managers has shown that respondents rarely leave any items unanswered. However, if there is any missing data the remedies include computing the mean item score using only the available data for that tactic, or not including the respondent in the analysis for a scale if there is missing data for more than one item in the scale.

Section snippets

Psychometric analyses

The primary focus of this article is on validation studies for the IBQ-G, but in a few cases results for the IBQ-R are also presented. The validation studies involve a variety of different methods recommended by prominent scholars (e.g., Campbell, 1976, Cronbach and Meehl, 1955, Hinkin, 1995). We assessed convergent and discriminant validity, internal consistency reliability, stability of scale scores over time, criterion-related validity for three different criteria (target commitment, target

Discussion

Several studies on the extended target version of the IBQ-G indicate that the questionnaire measures an agent's use of the 11 tactics with an acceptable degree of accuracy when the target is a subordinate or peer. In this final section we describe some limitations and potential problems to avoid when using the IBQ-G for research, we suggest questions that should be explored in future research with the questionnaire, we briefly mention practical applications of the questionnaire, and we make a

Practical applications and the scientist–practitioner approach

Development of the IBQ exemplifies the scientist/practitioner approach. Research with the IBQ and other methods provided insights about effective ways to use the tactics and the conditions for which they are most appropriate. This knowledge was incorporated into developmental activities for improving influence skills. The primary application has been the use of multi-source feedback workshops for managers. We found that most managers can quickly learn the differences among the 11 tactics, and

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