Positional & Personal Power
There are two kinds of leadership power in organizations: positional power and personal power
. The people with positional power are the ones with titles: CEO, Vice President, Director, Manager, etc. Others in the organization may not have titles, but have the charisma, relationships, and influence that draw others to them and help them get things done: they've got personal power. When someone has both it's a wonderful blend, but too often the two exist independently. Understanding where you fall on each spectrum is crucial if you hope to proactively manage how others perceive you as a leader.A good friend of mine, for example, is a Vice President at a pharmaceutical company. Making the leap to that level in the organization, however, took some adjustment. After one of her first meetings in the new role, she called me and said, "I think I blew it." As a director in her previous company, part of her style was to think out loud. At the time, it was something her peers welcomed; they could share ideas, build on one another's thoughts, and come up with something better than any of them would have on their own. As a VP, however, her comments landed very differently. In this role, people were looking to her for "the answer." She'd offer an idea and they'd align themselves around this new direction. When she offered different ideas on the same topic, others experienced her as indecisive. Her intent was to throw a bunch of ideas at the wall and see what stuck, but others perceived her as not having a clear focus. One of the things she learned was that, while it's okay to have all those ideas, you have to be mindful of how they land on the audience; you have to be able to categorize and prioritize your ideas. Once she understood she could do that without constraining her thinking-that it was more about how she presented her many thoughts-she became quite good at it.
She was learning about her positional power: when her role changed, the behaviors expected of her changed, as well. She hadn't considered what her context-as the positional head of her department-meant for how she needed to "show up" to the organization. As people rise the corporate ladder, these sorts of realizations are common.
In the same manner, I find many informal leaders don't realize the amount of sway they hold in their organizations. I'm working on a project now with a large cross-functional team. The positional leaders have been extraordinary in their attention to the project, empowering their team members, communicating consistently, and ensuring alignment among their stakeholders. Among their members, however, are two individuals who are choosing not to engage with the process. They are informal leaders, and are among the senior members on the team; others look to these two as a barometer for how fully they should engage with the process. They're going through the motions and the essential work is still getting done, but they're withholding their discretionary effort. As informal leaders can have a tremendous impact on the success of an initiative, it is well worth identifying them from the start and actively soliciting their participation. It's a shame that these two leaders are choosing to behave in this way because:
* It impacts both the team's morale and its performance. While the sponsors have laid forth some strong inspirational goals, these individuals are causing people to question their sincerity. When issues like this arise, energy is diverted from critical project work.
* It impacts their future within the organization. Their superiors are watching to gauge readiness for the next levels of leadership, hoping they can find a way to use their tremendous personal power to advance the organization's business goals.
While these two individuals are behaving as if they are victims of the organization, the truth is that they are victims of their own mindsets and actions.
The lesson here is not only for informal leaders, but for positional leaders as well: that you have full control over your individual choices, and that how you choose has a strong relationship to both your success and the success of your organization.
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