You Probably Have Less Power than You Think
My daughter walks very slowly—maddeningly so. If you stare hard and squint at this picture from the other day, you can barely see Zola walking a full half block slower than the rest of us.
The thing that makes her casual walking speed so frustrating is that in those moments, she’s in complete control. She may rely on us for food, clothes, and shelter, but she’s in power while we’re walking.
This mirrors the situation many of us find in organizations. Our titles and the official descriptions of our roles and responsibilities make it seem like we’re in power. Yet, in reality, we're completely dependent on others who supposedly have lower status.
In the book Power and Influence, John Kotter describes the manager-subordinate relationship this way: “I think it is common to think of relationships to subordinates as being like lateral relations, except that you have some formal authority to direct the other parties. As such, relations to subordinates somehow seem easier to handle, because you have more control. The reality is that relations to subordinates can be just as difficult to handle as are those outside the chain of command. But the nature of the difficulties involved tends to be somewhat different. Supervisors are usually considerably more dependent on key subordinates than on anyone outside the chain of command.”
This mostly happens because our subordinates typically know more about the details of the work than we do, and because they are not easily replaced.
The point: When we analyze our own power, and who has power in our environments, looking at the organization chart or people's job descriptions is often misleading. Instead, it’s more important to look at who needs to take what actions if we’re to achieve our goals. That’s where the power is.
The other implication, of course, is that leaders need to cultivate their subordinates as true followers. They’ll always have the power to screw us over—we just need to make sure they don’t want to!
Something Fun
I became well aware of this power dynamic when leaving the house the other day. I’d scored a prime parking spot right in front of my house the night before. I discovered the next morning that someone managed to get into the spot behind me with only about two inches of space to spare.
I thought, “Why would you park in a space that tight? You almost surely had to bump and scratch your car to get in there.”
Then I realized: He who has the already-dented car holds all the power. It was I, the owner of the unscratched car, who actually had the problem.
