Why Status Comes Before Power and How To Get It
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What will make you happy in your career? Studies have shown that it's not how much money you earn but the respect and admiration you receive from others, also known as social status. Research by Cameron Anderson, a psychologist at the University of California, Berkeley, and his colleagues supports the case for status over salary in before they graduated and after they were working full-time jobs with varied financial earnings.
One of the best predictors of career satisfaction is status. But people sometimes confuse status with power, or they might even conflate status with salary. How many times have you heard someone say, "That decision is above my pay grade"?
When pursuing a career, you might think you should first pursue salary or power, then status will follow. Maybe you have misconceptions about status as being all about the job title.
Before charting your course, let's define terms.
Power vs. Status
Power and status are both sources of influence, according to Alison Fragale, research psychologist, professor, and author. They are also similar in that they are a fundamental human need. But the main difference is control.
"Power is controlling resources that have value to you and value to others," Fragale said as a guest "Money is a resource. The ability to hire and fire is a resource. So, you are in control of something that has value to you and other people."
If you control the budget, or information, or someone's performance review, people are much more likely to do what you say. That's influence through power.
"Status is how much you're respected and highly regarded by other people," Fragale said. "If I look at you, and I think, I really respect you and value you, I'm much more likely to listen to what you say. I'm going to trust that your ideas are good.
"The difference is that (with power) you can control resources even if people oppose you. With status, it's a judgment in other people's minds."
What Should You Prioritize?
The question should not be, "What is more important, status or power?" They both are. But as a higher education professional, you can easily get caught up in power struggles with executive leadership or decision makers in your department, tenure and promotion committees, or other people with control.
"If you pursue status before, or at least alongside power, everything is going to fall into place," Fragale said. "Status makes power a lot easier to achieve, and it makes power a lot easier to use. If you are respected by your audience, all the other good things are just going to start to come a lot easier."
Two Ways To Gain Status
OK, so you want more status. There are two ways to get people to respect you, according to Fragale. They are what psychologists identify as warmth and assertiveness.
1. Warmth
The first is something people don't often associate with status -- do you care about others?
"If I communicate to my audience that I care about them and at least care about somebody that's not just me, (people) respect that," Fragale said. "We don't want to interact with selfish people or competitive people who are going to hurt us. We want to interact with people who are going to make our lives better."
Start every interaction you have with others with questions about them. Think about or combine your talents and resources to achieve better outcomes. Be someone who gives energy to others instead of seeking it for yourself. Don't try to make people think you are the most clever person on campus -- leave the impression that the person you are talking to is.
2. Assertiveness
The second way to achieve status involves efficacy and conscientiousness -- can people rely on you?
"Even if I think you care, if I can't trust you to execute anything well, I'm not really going to respect you because I can't depend on you," Fragale said. "I need to convince you that I care and I can take charge of my environment and I know what I'm doing."
You might care so much about people that you try to sell them a bill of goods that you can't deliver. That's not going to help you gain status. Be known on your campus as someone who can get things done, not someone who flakes on their responsibilities or makes false promises. And if you don't have capacity, simply tell people that you can't give a project the attention it deserves.
3 Tips for Sustaining Status and Power
The goal is to balance warmth and assertiveness, but in doing so, you can easily backslide in your pursuit of status and power. To prevent this, incorporate mindsets of abstraction, personal growth, and knowing your preferences.
1. Abstract thinking.
Abstraction and assertiveness are not contradictions. You might consider a leader who thinks concretely and implements action as being assertive. But, as Chris Lipp, author of "The Science of Personal Power," explained , people who talk more abstractly convey more personal power. "Don't confuse abstract with vagueness," Lipp said. An implementation focus -- "Do this" or "This is right" -- means less power and status than those who see and communicate the big picture and deliberate -- "Let's weigh the pros and cons."
This makes sense when you consider the hierarchy of organizational leadership. Top-level executives and managers communicate broadly the "what" and the "why," while the lower status production employees provide the "how."
"The more abstract you speak, the more you can take in greater information from the environment -- rather than being very narrow -- the more perceived power you have," Lipp said.
2. Personal growth.
You can overindex on status and become a people-pleaser without growing your personal knowledge or skills. Quoting Dan Sullivan, the founder of Strategic Coach, author Benjamin Hardy wrote in his book that when people's status becomes more important than their growth, they usually stop growing. "When growth is your genuine motive, then you usually end up getting lots of status," Hardy wrote. "But you won't be attached to it."
3. Know Your Preferences.
You might be pursuing status or power for the sake of it without realizing what truly makes you happy. Higher education professionals might attain a doctoral degree or a professorship because of the status it brings, but then they wind up resenting the work.
"We seek status because we don't know our own preferences," Agnes Callard, philosopher from University of Chicago, .
consider the lifestyle you want, the work you'll be doing, and the people you get to serve before chasing status and power, and ask yourself if it is worth it.
In Conclusion
Achieving status and power might be a good means to an end if you want career satisfaction, but it shouldn't be your ultimate goal. Pursue status before power, but don't be their masters. Let them serve you along your way to a fulfilling career.
