Is Leadership about Power or Empowerment

Power is the great thing if you can use it wisely to make a positive influence and empower others to do the same!

Power has many different formats; some visible, some invisible; some are earned, some are given; some are delightful, some are intimidating; here are a few different types of powers: position power is associated with people who are in a position to ‘boss” others. People fear the consequences of not doing what is asked of them. Expert power comes from a person’s expertise. This is commonly a person with an acclaimed skill or accomplishment. Influence power is associated with people who are well-liked and respected hold this kind of power. What’s the correlation between leadership and power? Is leadership more about power or empowerment?

A high mature leader needs to practice more influence power and expertise power, and use position power wisely: Like many things, power is like the two sides of the coin: In understanding power you can see how it can be used and then how you can give it to others to achieve the objectives you want. Given that the boss's power is based on his/her demonstrated ability to boss her/his people, she/he is probably fearful of letting that power go and might try her best to hang onto it; in other words, managers hold the power to "boss" the worker around, using any number of carrots and sticks. A boss in this situation might not make the decision to trust her/his team and empower them; she/he may give 'lip-service' to empowerment yet not back up empowerment with actions, which further confuses a team. If anyone views leadership solely from this perspective, you are missing all the positive aspects of leadership that pragmatic business people use every day to inspire and motivate their work teams to achieve agreed-upon goals.

Leadership should be thought of in terms of empowering others. Empowerment is about transforming someone by increasing their capacity or abilities in order to help them make better choices that lead to desired outcomes. Empowerment can multiply performance by quantum levels because it demonstrates management's respect for the employee, your high expectations for excellence in performance, and your tangible and bold statement that the employee is valued and trusted. This enhances the employee’s self-esteem which in turn enhances his or her ownership of the task which unleashes his/her potential. Therefore, untapped talent, creativity, and genius, which ultimately can result in speedy, cost-effective, innovative, and high-quality outcomes.

Power is the State of Mind! The power can be earned by way of an empowering, developmental, Pygmalion, and collaborative leadership style and why that power is absolutely essential for the high achievement of an empowered team or work unit. Power is essential to leadership, focus, corporate agility, and competitive survival. The power that is earned by means of entrepreneurial, empowering, and developmental leadership is the engine that drives and guides a healthy, growing, and learning organization. We have to remember that organizations are going about empowerment from different angles. They need to empower the change agent for more radical business transformation, they may also be comfortable or motivated somehow with slow, incremental change. Different styles for different starting points and different expectation.

Power is the state of beings. It is about being who I am and respecting another person to do the same. despite how I see that in my world. To practice leadership power effectively, it is about empowerment which can be broken down into statements of acknowledgment and support. Power is the great thing if you can use it to make a positive influence on the world via planting seeds of empowerment, inspiration, and creative possibilities.

Posted in: Future of Leadership