If a leader wants to lead a follower the leader has three wellsprings from which they can draw. The first is power. The second is authority. And the third is influence.
Presuming that “A” is the leader and “B” the follower, here the definitions and distinctions.
- Power is A’s capacity to get B to do what A wants, whatever B’s preferences, by any means necessary, including the use of force.
- Authority is A’s capacity to get B to do what A wants, whatever B’s preferences, because of A’s superior position, rank, status, or credential.
- Influence is A’s capacity to get B to do what A wants, whatever B’s preferences, of B’s own volition.
In the past, leaders in America were able to draw on all three. Leaders in government and business, in the military and the media, in religion and education, whatever their sector, had the benefit of abundance. So, occasionally they drew on power; frequently they drew on authority; and regularly they used influence to get their followers to do what they wanted them to do.
These were of course applied in different ways and different measures by different leaders. Longtime CEO of JPMorgan, Jamie Dimon is a different leader in a different time from longtime CEO of General Electric, Jack Welch. As is President Donald Trump from President Jimmy Carter. Still, the essentials remained the same. Power, authority, and influence were available to leaders who wanted to lead.
But leadership is not a person, it is a system with three parts, each of which is of equal importance. Leaders, and followers, and contexts. The last is why it’s likely that leadership in America will forever be different from leadership in China.
Context though is not just about place. It is also about time. So, leading in America in the year 2025 is different from leading in America in the year 2000 and very different from leading in America in 1975 or 1950. Changes in technology are an obvious example of how times change, and of how these changes impact how leaders lead, and followers follow.
But I write here about something less obvious. About how one of the three wellsprings to which I referred – authority – has been, though not completely depleted, greatly reduced. Authority is far less valuable a resource for leaders, especially for leaders in America, than it used to be.
Specifically, position and rank still matter. They especially matter in the workplace where subordinates are still inclined to fall in line behind their superiors. What matters less though than it did is status. We are less in awe of those more highly situated than we used to be. But what matters much, much, less than it did is credential. Whatever credential we have, whatever our claim to knowledge or expertise, it is no longer so important, nor does it any longer entitle leaders to lead followers.
In 2017 Tom Nichols wrote a book, The Death of Expertise, in which he pointed to a trend. “Not only,” he wrote, “do increasing numbers of lay people lack basic knowledge, they reject fundamental rules of evidence…. This is more than a natural skepticism toward experts. I fear we are witnessing the death of expertise itself.” A similar point was made by Gil Eyal, in his book, The Crisis of Expertise.
Recently were two articles that lent the argument further credence. In the New York Times piece, “The Expert Class Joins the Endangered List in Today’s Washington,” David Sanger wrote: “The most dangerous occupation in Washington these days is being an expert.” As Sanger points out, not just denigrated but dismissed in the last several months were government experts in the military, national security, intelligence, aviation, cybersecurity, veterans’ issues, public health, you name it.
An article in The New Yorker by Daniel Immerwahr, “Doctor’s Orders,” focused on Americans’ increasingly widespread resistance to experts who are doctors and scientists. Even in the recent past we trusted them. Now not so much. Robert F. Kennedy. Jr., President Donald Trump’s choice for Secretary of Health and Human Services, is a cause or maybe a consequence of the syndrome. He adheres to beliefs that mainstream science discredit and espouses ones that are marginal. Kennedy is suspicious of the pharmaceutical industry, supports unproven and unsanctioned drugs, and makes wild accusations against members of the medical establishment. Whatever their errors and failures, when science and medicine are attacked, when experts in any field are excluded or derided, and when the vice president of the United States says we must “honestly and aggressively attack the universities,” it’s safe to conclude the authority of the credential has bit the dust.
Many American leaders are in positions of leadership precisely because they are experts. When their claim to authority is based on their expertise which, however, now counts for little or even nothing, their authority obviously is weakened.
It’s one of the reasons why leading in 21st century America is not just difficult but thankless. Ever ask yourself why just last year CEO turnover rates reached record levels?