You are the system

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Welcome to Wednesday Wisdom. This week we discuss how you're not outside the environment and neither is anyone else.

In yesterday's Ask A Strategist AMA we revisited one of my favourite John Clarke clips: The Front Fell Off.

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My favourite moment is when the Minister asserts they towed the boat outside the environment.

If you are part of a system - which you are, whether that’s a family, an organisation, or a government - there is no "outside the environment." None of us are neutral. Everybody is contributing, in some way, to how that system operates.

The power is always with someone else

When we're a cog in the wheel, subject to the whims of our boss, clients, CEO, or Minister, it's easy to direct that frustration upward and think that person, if they wanted, could just fix everything. Not you, who's stuck in the middle putting up with them.

But if you asked them, they'd tell you they're constrained too. They've got their own pressures, expectations, and trade-offs, and more layers of approval - their boss, voters, shareholders - than you realise.

You'd be forgiven for thinking nobody has the power to change things.

If you thought that, you'd be both right and wrong. This is the difference between positional power and relational power.

Positional power vs relational power

There is no position, however senior, that can wave a magic wand and single-handedly transform a complex system of people, processes, roles, interactions and workflows. A system is a dynamic product of how its parts interact.

This is why hiring a new CEO, getting somebody new in the role, or electing a new government, doesn't necessarily deliver different outcomes. The system keeps doing what it's doing regardless of the people in it. Specific people in specific positions can drive transformative change, but swapping people without changing relationships rarely works.

Because a system is built on relational power, no single person has total control. Even in the top job, you depend on others to action your decisions - and you can’t control the outcomes.

Power lives in the connections

Relational power lives in connection points. This is both confronting and reassuring.

If every part of a system affects how a system behaves, through its interactions, every part of a system has the power to influence it. Whether you're the CEO or a frontline staff member, changing how your part interacts with others will have flow-on effects.

By clarifying the conditions that decisions are made under, changing what is rewarded or punished, or altering how information flows, you can shift system dynamics. Some of those shifts will be visible, and some won't, but either way: your choices count.

Power isn’t equal, but it's real

That's not to say power, or responsibility, is fairly or evenly distributed. Everyone influences the system, but not everyone has equal room to manoeuvre in it. There's a difference between facing a grumpy Board Chair and battling real job insecurity inside yet another restructure.

It's also true that using your influence, however limited, may come with trade-offs you may not be willing (or able) to make. Those constraints are real. But so is your potential for influence. Do with that what you wish.