This study was undertaken to determine the power bases used by middle school and high school principals in the Baltimore city Public schools (BCPS), and how their use of power affects teachers' satisfaction with their work and their principal. The three research questions posed in this study were:

1. To what extent is there a correlation between teacher satisfaction with work and supervisor, and the teacher's perceived classification of his/her principal's use of power?
2. To what extent is there congruence between the principal's self-perception of his/her use of power and the teacher's perception of the principal's use of power?
3. Are there differences in the middle school and high school principals' uses of power based on their teachers' perceived classifications? The subjects for this study were middle school principals, middle school teachers, high school principals, and high school teachers in the BCPS. The middle school and high school principals completed the Power Perception Profile: Perception of Self (PPPS). The middle school and high school teachers completed the Power Perception Profile: Perception of Other (PPPO) and the Cornell Job Description Index (JDI). Of the 41 principals, 24 principals volunteered to participate. The middle school and high school tenured teachers numbered 922. Of the 922 tenured teachers, 387 tenured teachers returned the instrument. The seven power bases measured by the PPPS and the PPPO were (a) coercive power, (b) connection power, (c) information power, (d) expert power, (e) legitimate power, (f) referent power, and (g) reward power. The subtests used to measure the teachers' level of satisfaction were (a) Supervision, and (b) Work on Present Job. Based on the findings of this study, teacher dissatisfaction with principal or with work is associated with the principal's use of coercive power, connection power, and reward power. The principal's use of information power did not appear to affect teacher satisfaction with work or supervisor . The relationship between the principal's use of legitimate power and teacher satisfaction with work and supervisor was inconclusive. The principal 's use of expert power and referent power is associated with teacher satisfaction with work and with principal. In addition, the findings indicated that the middle school principals' perceptions of their uses of power were not congruent with their teachers' perceptions. The high school principals' perceptions of their uses of power were congruent with the high school teachers' perceptions, with the exception of connection power . An analysis of variance was done between the middle school teachers' ratings of the middle school principals' power styles and the high school teachers' ratings of the high school principals' power styles to determine if there were differences in the middle school and high school principals' uses of power. The results of the analyses indicated that the principals fell into three groups. The three groups were (a) positional power, (b) personal power, and (c) a combination of personal and positional power. The middle school principals used more positional power bases than personal power bases to induce compliance from or to influence their teachers. The high school principals used a combination of personal and positional power bases to induce compliance from or to influence their teachers. The findings from this study, based on the teachers' perceptions, indicate that middle school principals use (a) coercion, (b) their legitimate authority, and (c) the rewards that are available to them to induce compliance from or to influence their teachers. They use less referent power and expert power. The high school principals use more referent power and expert power than coercive power or reward power to induce compliance from or to influence their teachers.