How does the Power Paradox play out?

In this article we unpack the tell-tale behavioural signs of the Power Paradox at work and how those behaviours may play out in management.

You will recall from the previous article (“What is the Power Paradox and how does it work? – A case study”) that the underlying patterns present in someone falling prey to the Power Paradox are:

less interest in another’s point of view
more impulsiveness
more disinhibition
greater self-focus
less ability to relate empathically to others.

Thanks to Julie Diamond’s work and her Diamond Power Index we can now paint a very detailed picture of the poor behavioural habits that those who fall prey to the Power Paradox are likely to display.

Those specific behavioural habits may include, but are not limited to:

turning up late to meetings (and not acknowledging or apologising)
discussing only the task and rarely giving the team feedback on how they are doing their work
talking too much and listening too little
rushing meetings and consequently failing to notice group tensions, and
indulging in outbursts when things don’t go as planned.

The dependency loop

Remember Rex from the case study? Rex was elevated into a more powerful role but became dependent on the feelings of power that came with the job in order to survive the stress of the role. He is caught in a dependency loop. He has developed a new set of interactional habits that help to temporarily reduce the stress (some of which are listed above). The problem is that those new behavioural habits also make him less effective with others and erode his judgment.

The more dependent Rex becomes on the feelings of power that the job brings, as a means of reducing his stress, the less skilful he becomes with the people around him.

The initial behaviours that facilitated trust in voters, and got him elevated in the first place, have now become sadly rare, and he probably hasn’t even noticed.

The Power Paradox plays out

Where to from here for Rex? Unfortunately, this is when his problems get even bigger. There are a number of consequences of Rex’s new raft of unhelpful habits:

Rex’s team no longer feel safe enough to be honest with him, and struggle to tell him that he is becoming difficult to work with.
Because of Rex’s increasingly uncivil behaviour, his team will become less likely to engage in acts of vulnerability such as telling him about bad news, asking for help, offering new ideas, raising project failings or challenging his behaviour.
Rex’s staff turnover will begin to increase, as his most talented staff members look elsewhere for inspirational leadership.
Those Rex represents won’t feel as heard by him, or as united by him. Meeting and listening to voters simply does not relieve his stress as effectively as sitting in Business Class seats.
Deprived of accurate feedback about his behaviour, Rex develops a bubble around himself.

Ultimately, those who first supported and elevated him, in this case the voters, ultimately will no longer sense that Rex is for the collective good. They won’t experience him as understanding their needs or acting in a way that helps them. They’ll perceive that he’s acting in his own best interests, even if he doesn’t believe this. Eventually he will be voted out.

This is the Power Paradox at work.

In diagram form it looks like this:

As Professor Keltner said,

“… the seductions of power induce us to lose the very skills that enabled us to gain power in the first place.”

This is why the rise and fall pattern we see in many high-profile people throughout history is so ubiquitous. The Power Paradox can be outsmarted, but most fall prey to it.

Perhaps you might be thinking that a democratic political environment is too obvious a case study for the Power Paradox to play out.

I want to assure you that this principle is hard at work in other contexts as well. My own work as a corporate consultant working with senior and middle management teams for almost 25 years has exposed me to this principle almost weekly.

I share more about that in the next article – “What about the Power Paradox in management? Can it be outsmarted?”

Dr. Paul Donovan

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I wish to acknowledge the Dharug and Gundungarra people, and the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation as the Traditional Owners of the lands where I live and work.
I pay my respects to their Elders past, present and emerging.