Powerdrunks: How They Got That Way, and Why You Might Become One

Note from Phil: What follows is a guest post from one of my favorite authors Sally Hogshead. Her new book is amazing, and the energy she exudes when she speaks is, to say the least, inspiring and thought provoking. What follows is a very fascinating article I know you’ll enjoy.

The Hollywood producer lighting up a fat Cuban cigar in a nonsmoking restaurant. The Fortune 100 CEO stealing from the employee pension cookie jar. The homophobic televangelist who gets caught in a gay affair. Yes, we all know grossly entitled behavior when we see it: people making up their own rules as they go along, waving away consequences with a contemptuous sniff that seems to say, “only the little people pay taxes.”

These, my friends, are the Powerdrunks. And in the grips of power, you just might become a one, too.

Why does it happen? And under what circumstances would your own inner Powerdrunk awaken? The answer lies in a combination of the brain’s hardwiring, and our natural tendency to become utterly irrational under certain circumstances.

Power is one form of “fascination”— an instinctive and irresistible form of attraction. Neurologically, fascination lives in the limbic area of the brain. It’s a primal response, more instinctive than intellectual. In a state of fascination, we simply fail to behave logically. We buy sports cars we can’t afford, we procrastinate on deadlines, we cheat on diets (and taxes and spouses).

Power is one of the behavioral triggers I describe in my book, FASCINATE. There are exactly seven motivations behind all human behavior, including vice, lust, and mystique. Every trigger creates a different response, and brings out a different side of our personality. The power trigger explains why perfectly nice people can suddenly become, well, self-righteous bastards.

Executives Behaving Badly

Power is an intoxicating potion, interfering with our usual ability to think rationally. Social psychologist Deborah Gruenfeld studies the effect that power has upon powerful people. As people experience power, says Gruenfeld, they become disinhibited: less likely to control themselves and their behavior, less concerned with what others think of them, and more likely to flout cultural constraints and consequences. “When people experience power, they stop trying to control themselves; they forget that there are social consequences.”

Power lowers inhibitions, making it easier for faulty decision-making to overcome good judgment. Things that might seem entirely unthinkable under other circumstances suddenly don’t seem so far-fetched. In this semi-delusional state, people become far more likely to indulge in reckless behavior. (Say, for example… lying in press conferences about fathering a child with a campaign employee… or doing bong hits in public despite having recently won a 14^th Olympic gold medal. Hypothetically, of course.)

The Economist describes that in the throes of power, people feel “at some intuitive level that they are entitled to take what they want. This sense of entitlement is crucial to understanding why people misbehave in high office.” In high office, and in the corner office.

Yet this mega-megalomania isn’t just for billionaire CEOs and Wall Street insider traders. From a county judge who abuses his privileges, to a winning high school coach who encourages steroid use, an increase in power bestows a false sense of invulnerability. Served the right situational cocktail, you too could become a pompous prima donna.

So how about it? Shall we explore your own inner Powerdrunk?

The F Score personality test

Power is one of the seven triggers in your personality. To find out the role of these triggers in your own life, I developed the F Score test. Based on in-depth marketing research of over a thousand Americans conducted specifically on the topic of fascination, this personality test reveals which two main triggers you naturally apply when persuading others.

If power is your primary trigger, then you’re the alpha dog: an authority of the group, and in control of your actions. You prefer to actively lead situations, rather than sitting back and passively watching from the back row. You’ll follow other people’s rules, if needed, but you prefer to define your own set of rules on your own terms.

Yet, be warned. Your strong opinions and bold action often spark reactions from others, and not always positively. You expect others to obey, and tend to use deadlines and demands of the alarm trigger, which can be intimidating and off-putting.

Power, like all natural strengths, can rather quickly devolve into weakness. How to avoid falling prey to the Powerdrunk phenomenon? Minimize the vice trigger, to avoid the perception of being erratic. Increase your prestige trigger, for respect and gravitas. And finally make sure that you’re also using the trust trigger, to help others feel that you’re dependable, with consistent performance and expectations. Otherwise, you could be facing a power hangover.

About the author: Sally Hogshead is a speaker, brand innovation expert, and the author of FASCINATE: Your 7 Triggers to Persuasion and Captivation. (Her own primary trigger? Power, of course.)

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