Think of formal power this way:  Your position on your employers organizational chart, or your title, or both, give you the power to make decisions, hold others accountable, and direct activity.   When it comes to a disagreement, you can “win” or come out on top because at the end of the day, you have greater authority then the other person, or group, with whom you may have a differing opinion.  You might or might not take what they have to say into consideration in your decision-making, but the bottom line is your position makes the outcome in your power.  Maybe.  Now let’s talk about informal power.

Informal power is an intriguing concept.   Although you may not know what it is right now, when you are done reading this blog, I would bet my car on the fact that you will recognize someone who has it, and uses it.  Or maybe it’s you.  Informal power is something that isn’t a result of a position within an organization.  It is power that an individual in an organization can have, at any level that may be a result of a charismatic personality.  Think of someone at work who may be a low level worker who seems to have a “following” of others and can either calm down or whip up the masses.  THAT is informal power.    Here is another way to gain information power.  It can come from a friendship and/or reporting relationship.  If there is an executive assistant, that the executive likes, that person will have informal power a go-go.  Or, maybe the executive just really likes one of the people who is lower on the organizational chart.

Imagine this scenario:  You are a mid-level manager at an organization where the CEO has a secretary with whom they get along with well.  You are irritated with the secretary because (let’s just pretend it’s a “she”) seems to make decisions that get put into place and upheld and affect the entire organization.  Since you, and every other manager, hold a higher position on the org chart you wonder why this secretary gets to make high-level decisions.  To add insult to injury you aren’t even asked your opinion on these items.  Tomorrow I will blog about an illustrative example of informal power at work.