How will you use your power?
I just finished Jeffrey Pfeffer’s book 7 Rules of Power, subtitled Surprising–but True–Advice on How to Get Things Done and Advance Your Career.
The rules are deceptively simple, and yet most people don’t do them, out of fear that others won’t like them (Rule 1: Get Out Of Your Own Way) and they’ll get in trouble for stepping out of line (Rule 2: Break the Rules). They don’t think they deserve power, so they don’t act powerful (Rule 3: Appear Powerful).
Rules 4 (Build a Powerful Brand) and 5 (Network Relentlessly) are straightforward, while Rule 6 (Use Your Power) trips people up for the same reason as Rules 1 and 2 – they don’t believe they have the right to use power, so they don’t.
Those who have the will to use their power achieve greater results, which leads to more power, leading to the depressing Rule 7: Success Excuses (Almost) Everything. Pfeffer makes the case that once you have power, you keep power, because people want to associate with people who can make things happen, so you can rewrite the story of how you got the power (the people you exploited and the rules you broke).
The concepts are easy, but practicing them is hard, because of our cultural conditioning to follow rules and please others. People don’t like Pfeffer’s books on power because they think the world shouldn’t work that way, or that these power tactics won’t work for them. His point is that you will be more effective if you acknowledge that this is how power works today, and he includes stories from people without privilege or advantages successfully using these tactics to address the objection that it won’t work for everybody.
I experienced cognitive dissonance reading the book because I would agree that his description of a rule made sense, while also recognizing that I wasn’t following them myself.
I’ve also started pointing out to clients when they aren’t recognizing the power dynamics they are facing, especially when they have more power than they think and aren’t using it to advance their agenda.
What power do you have? And how will you use it?
#power #success #youhaveachoice