Power_ Why Some People Have Itand Others Don't - Jeffrey Pfeffer [42]
“But,” you may say, “I’m just starting out,” or “I’m mired in some midlevel job,” or “I’m involved in a serious competition for promotion to a position of more influence. If I had control over lots of jobs and budget, I wouldn’t need to read about how to get power—I would already have it!” True enough. But there are numerous examples of people who have made something out of almost nothing. They understood that building a power base is a process of accumulating leverage and resource control little by little over time. It’s important to be able to see or even create opportunities that others may miss—and even more important to have the patience and persistence to follow through on those opportunities.
CREATING SOMETHING OUT OF ALMOST NOTHING
It would be nice to be Sergey Brin or Larry Page, cofounders of Google, or Bill Gates of Microsoft. As they move through venues like the World Economic Forum, they are surrounded not just by security staff but by people who want to meet them and get close to them and the organizations they lead. But you can begin from where you are. In fact, one of the big mistakes I see people make is to think that they can’t build a resource base from their current position—they need to be higher up. Getting to higher-level positions is easier and more likely if you build a power base, and it is never impossible or too soon or too late to begin.
A resource is anything people want or need—money, a job, information, social support and friendship, help in doing their job. There are always opportunities to provide these things to others whose support you want. Helping people out in almost any fashion engages the norm of reciprocity—the powerful, almost universal behavioral principle that favors must be repaid. But people do not precisely calculate how much value they have received from another and therefore what they owe in return. Instead, helping others generates a more generalized obligation to return the favor, and as a consequence, doing even small things can produce a comparatively large payoff.
Provide Attention and Support
Sometimes building a relationship so that others will help you requires nothing more than being polite and listening. One of the most amazing things about Willie Brown’s rise to power in the California Assembly was that he originally got the job because of the support of numerous conservative Republican legislators who were elected after a tax-cutting initiative and swept into power with President Ronald Reagan. Brown received this support even though he was best known for promoting legislation to relax the penalties for possessing small amounts of marijuana and decriminalizing homosexual activity. The source of the bond: when conservative Republican legislators got together for lunch, they talked about how Brown, at the time the chairman of a powerful committee, treated them fairly, gave them a chance to speak, listened to their points, and occasionally even agreed with them.5 Being nice to people is effective because people find it difficult to fight with those who are being polite and courteous.
Small things can matter a lot—attending birthday parties, funerals, going to lunch with people whose help you want, visiting them or their family members when they are ill. Senator Ted Kennedy was an unabashed liberal who worked diligently during his 47 years in the U.S. Senate to promote bills and causes he believed in. His ability to get things done and the number of friends he had even among conservative Republicans came from his skill and assiduousness at being friendly, listening, and spending time with others at events that were important to them. So here’s some simple and practical advice: most people like to talk about themselves—give them the opportunity to do so. Being a good listener and asking questions about others is a simple but effective way to use a resource everyone has—time and attention—to build power. And