Put Authority in the Bin to Lead Brilliantly

When it comes to great leadership, people tend to jump straight to notions of authority. Undeniably, power and authority used to be praised decades ago in the workplace. Sadly it still is in places, remnants persist!

Here are 4 starting blocks to help you unpick why authority needs to go into landfill when it comes to being a brilliant leader.

Starting block 1: The key to brilliant leadership is influence, not authority.

Understanding influence is essential for any organisation, team or individual who seeks success.

In fact, at work and in life. Games of power and influence happen everyday. You may think you’ve got the power when you’re on the phone with your telecom provider to complain about your latest invoice. Who is influencing whom in the conversation? How do they perceive your power? How do YOU perceive your own power? I am pretty sure that if I’d asked both, I’d get different answers.

Starting block 2: everyone has power yet many of us are unaware of our perceived power.

There are two levels of perceived power: the formal and the informal ones.

• 25% of it is formal: position, seniority, length of service, age, track record of performance, reputation…
• 75% is informal: personality, energy, ambition, mood, humour, resilience, vision, ability to listen, determination, eager to learn…

The more powerful an individual, the more difficult it is for them to exert influence. Power is not a bad thing to have. It simply is an energy and a perception of us that needs to be considered and managed in order to influence. Your success will depend on how well you understand your perceived power and therefore greater strategies of influence you need to develop accordingly.

• Many of us tend to be unaware of the perceived power we have, and generally tend to believe we are powerless. Thus leading us to not be able to influence effectively.
• Denying your power is not a strategy. It’s merely reacting to your not liking the idea of being seen powerful. We all have power, even if many of us dread being seen as powerful for many reasons. Good things come from power. Having a sense of humour is part of one’s power, for example.

In order to be more influential, your first step is to (1) understand how to manage the perception of your power. Then only can you (2) develop strategies of influence to exceed that perceived power. Because without influence, an organisation can only really resort to the use of power to dictate / impose its wants.

Starting block 3: Being influential doesn’t equate being powerful.

When you are aware of your perceived power in a certain situation, you’ll then be able to identify the level of influence you’ll need to develop to be more influential than powerful. Or you can decide to stay powerful and keep driving.

With a direct and indirect influence strategies, a team / organisation can reap the reward of high engagement, commitment, ownership and participation.

 Your next step is to (3) identify the consequent level of influence you need to develop by mitigating the perceived power so you don’t hinder the ability to become influential.

• Influence is 25% direct: what can happen by what you say or do directly. Examples are improving what’s said / done in order to get other people to want to do things, improving the context of why something’s been said / done, improving how messages are delivered so that the words and actions encourage others do participate and commit.
• And 75% indirect: what you can get others to do or say on your behalf to make things happen. You could for example engage on a regular basis with people who quickly grasp what is happening / what is being said in a meeting, asking some for recommendations or share their opinions and experiences with others in a conference, or even creating forums for advocates to become influential with their peers.

Think of how reviews, recommendations, referrals can be very impactful in a context of influencing a recruiter, as an example.

So, remember that to become more influential than powerful to get more people to achieve more things, simply create direct and indirect influential strategies. It can be done very authentically.

Starting block 4: Influence is an energy that remains even after everyone has left the room!

The benefits of influence over power? Individuals, teams and organisation learn to delegate, nominate people for certain projects, allow others to be the driving force on their behalf to optimise capacity in all places. Think about one conversation that has influenced you for a long time. Probably still does to this date.

I remember the Head of the Global Marketing team at Lindt who was leading an international yearly marketing conference. She was talking about all the ideas we were putting forward for the Lindt Gold Bunny brand, including amending the brand book. She paused and looked at us – a room full of 50+ marketers. And said: “We are not here to entertain ourselves. Our consumers may come across Lindt Gold Bunny twice a year. We need to put our consumers first, not our boredom of seeing the same graphics everyday on our work screens.

 She was a woman of power, you could say, she was heading the Global Marketing team. But this didn’t land beautifully with me because of her position or seniority. It could have been a Junior Brand Manager who had said it, its echo would have equally hit me. It was how she had delivered a message other than “Let’s not follow this brand book initiative, we’re sticking to the brand book”.

Ready? Now think of a key meeting coming up next for you.

How do you think is your power perceived by others? Is this in line with what you think your power is? What influential strategies will you need to develop in order to exert your influence there and then?

I’d love to hear how this little experiment has gone for you! Message me here: [email protected]

Speak soon!

Mags, the Marketer Whisperer

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