Keep Power in Check When Making Decisions
Decisions are where beliefs and actions intersect. In this article about using your power effectively from the Harvard Business Review blog, John Baldoni lists three tips for keeping your power in check when making decisions. I especially like #1: What Good Can I Do With My Power?
Baldoni quotes Jesuit philosopher Baltasar Gracian saying “The sole advantage of power is that you can do more good.” That really hit home for me and I believe also for many of my clients. Anybody with any measure of influence today, breaks out into a cold sweat from time to time wondering if they are using their influence for the common good or selfish evil. (Or maybe that’s only true for people who were raised Catholic?)
After reading The Impulse Factor, a client in Philadelphia for whom I’m speaking next month reminded me of the solution to this struggle: Ensure you remain “directionally correct.” He had decided that this was a key concept that he wanted his financial planners across the country to own in the next year. He wants them to clearly define the directions for their branch offices to keep their confidence focused and on target every moment of every day.
Your direction is basically a one-sentence summary of both your primary strategic differentiator and your core values all rolled into one. Every organization and team should have a direction and so too should each of us as individuals–especially, powerful individuals. When you gain power and influence everything about you is magnified, including your confidence. If left unchecked, that helpful confidence and sense of control morphs into scattered and incoherent overconfidence. Power tends to make us believe that we can do absolutely anything. It’s why movie stars all of the sudden think they can be rock stars. It’s why Madonna sometimes thinks she is the reincarnation of Moses, Gandhi and Cicero. It’s why Michael Jordan thought that being the greatest basketball player of all time also qualified him to be a professional gambler and a Major League baseball player. And it’s also why powerful business leaders believe they can start taking risks that are way beyond the scope of what made them and their organizations successful.
The solution is to remain Directionally Correct by always checking your Decision Pulse. It’s fine to be bold. Great leaders possessing great power must take risks. They should push the envelope while encouraging their people to also do the same. You can even be a little dangerous. But once you start acting dangerously in the wrong direction, you must put apply the brakes. If you don’t, you might just might wind up in jail, out of a job or even worse–in the minor leagues.
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