Unlock Your Power: How the 5 Types of Influence Shape Success & Leadership

Ep 109. Discover the 5 Hidden Powers That Shape Influence, Leadership, and Success

From ancient empires to today’s digital age, power has always been the silent force behind human behavior, leadership, and global transformation. But power isn’t always loud or aggressive. In fact, the most effective types of power are often subtle, non-confrontational, and deeply transformational.

In this episode, we uncover the five essential types of power that determine how we influence others, lead teams, build relationships, and create real change in the world:

• Reward Power – Influence through incentives and benefits.
• Coercive Power – Control through consequences and discipline.
• Expert Power – Authority rooted in knowledge, skill, or wisdom.
• Legitimate Power – Influence through role, position, or title.
• Referent Power – Power driven by trust, admiration, and connection.

Whether you're leading a business, building a brand, managing a team, or navigating personal relationships, these power dynamics are at play — and understanding them can be your secret weapon.

We each gravitate toward certain types of power based on our personality, values, and roles in life — be it at work, in friendships, or at home. The key isn't just in gaining power, but in using it wisely, ethically.  Learn how to identify your personal power style, master influence without manipulation, and unlock your leadership potential.

Take care and walk well. 

Transcript

Welcome back folks to episode 109 of the Running Man Self Regulation Skills Project Podcast with me, your host Dr. Armando Dominguez, PhD in Health Psychology, licensed professional counselor and an adjunct professor at our local community college. What we're going to discuss today is going to be around different types of power. And the reason I said around is because not everyone is anything that's directly applicable in all senses to what you do every day because

you may experience one or the other or variations of said power. So I'll be given some distinct descriptions of types of power. And you may see bits and pieces of it. Rarely do ever see a system that's purely one or the other, unless it's a very high up organizational type of culture that goes on that is done distinctly that way. often here in the United States anyway, we see variations of applied power.

and influence and I want to go and look into what is it that we deal with whenever we're talking about self-regulation, whenever we're dealing with people that have power over us in the sense of work and authority, that is a type of power. Also formal authority such as something one would have with executive branch of government or even religion for that matter. And what about personal power? What does that have to do with everything?

because often how we self-regulate will be impacted by our own sense of personal power and our efficacy in applying that power. And I don't want to say perceived because it can be that, but I don't want to say achieved because it can also be transient, but not anything that's delusional, mind you. But I want us to kind of get an idea as to the ideas around power and those things that influence our choices and can keep us from, in some cases,

becoming very successful or failure and the things that we really want to do that are important to us. So from this point, we'll jump off into the different types of power and I'll define those here in a moment. So if we were to define power and we look at the 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene, it gives some ideas as to different types of power to create influence. Some have criticized the book and touted that it has been the release of some very dangerous secrets that shouldn't have been allowed out into the public.

armando (02:48.623)
that kind of speaks the state of the person's reading and criticizing and maybe kind of projecting their level of discomfort with others being in power and Realizing how they may not have the power that they'd like or maybe they've been burned by people that have been in power and Therefore they have this darker opinion of things now. The reason I mentioned this is that often how we perceive power is Based on how we are as an individual

how centric we are and if we have sense of self-efficacy, can I make change in my environment? Can I make things happen for myself? That is supply power, by the way, and influence those around me that can maybe support my ideas or way of doing things, even if it's like, you know, working at rolling something across the road to unblock a road, for instance. It could be temporary, it could be just a singular situation like that versus long-term application of

power and influence such as at a job or in government, this sort of thing. But back to the description of what power is. Power is a dynamic that socially occurs that if we look at things in a very base sense from where we're a cave people on Famigo and small tribes that often might made rights. the stronger you are, bigger you are, the more physically dominant and intimidating you were and the better hunter that you were provided clout, so to speak.

provided influence and also elevated your value in what we call the SMV or Cycle Marketplace or the Soful Market value if you will, not necessarily having to do with mating but it stems back to that very honestly so it's good to put that in there. But the amount of influence that we can create by virtue of our presence and what is projected at us in the sense that people expect us to be a certain way.

their estimations of us and our judgments of us based on prior behaviors that maybe indicates to them, wow, this guy's strong, he's a good hunter, she's really strong and she's a good mom, so therefore I can count on her to take care of the babies, this sort of thing. So we have ideas that go along with these assumptions based on prior performance. So power often is given to us versus taken from others, but also it's implied

armando (05:11.068)
by how people treat us as a result of the respect and deference. And whenever somebody gains accolades, for instance, for things that they've done, that does not necessarily mean that it has very cleanly transitioned all of their negatives and bad behaviors that in the past may have occurred and made them somehow higher or better. But often, depending on the intensity of a situation or how good a certain behavior is, we tend to put those things on the back burner that

relate to how human they were whenever they were a little lower on the totem pole and doing things that would have been considered a little unkind or dark. So keeping an open mind is important, not rewriting history and being able to remember not only ourselves but the selves of others sometimes can be very helpful when we're looking at how power develops and how it's applied in a dynamic social sense but more specifically with work and secondarily, well, how can I use that?

to create better change and improve myself situation for myself that I can create a better life for myself or my kiddos for instance. the 1960s there was some research done by French and Raven and they basically determined there were five types of power that people draw on to influence others. The dominant power base in whatever area that we're talking about whether it be government or a situation at work such that you know we have the authority.

and culture that is what we're walking into when we decide to go to work for somebody. We may see some of these and I'll kind of line these out in an order that they determined was the definition for each type. The first one was reward power and this has control over valued resources such as promotions and raises. The second type of power is called coercement power and had the ability to punish. The third type of power was expert power. This is based on knowledge and

I like this one. And the fourth one, legitimate power, comes with formal rank or position in the organization. And five, referent power, based on not only skill and liking, this is more like a popularity thing that we would see whenever we do popularity voting. But there's not only influence, but also implied character and assumptions that go along with that based on an image that has been cultured, so to speak.

armando (07:35.227)
So the question I would have regarding types of power is what kind of power base am I working within? Mind I told you rarely are they ever that discrete and perfectly aligned with one or the other, but you might see a little more of one and the other just depending on what organization you're in. But the important thing is how does that play out and how things work at the same place of employee or for that matter, the place that I trust to govern the nation that I live in.

And lately we've had political differences that are popping up left and right after this most recent election here in the United States. But this isn't anything new. Now, whenever we're thinking about power, often we see it from a very individualized, I, ego, me perspective, how it impacts or influences me and what I do or what I can't do as a result of said power that I have to interact with or I have to succumb to.

to be able to do what I would call living my life, so to speak. Now, the important point of the types of power is recognizing, well, which do I gravitate towards? If I were in a position where I'm guiding, if I am parenting, if I am teaching or starting a business or doing something that's an endeavor that might have other people with me that I might have to lead, how do I lead is the question. This is a very

Rhetorical self-directed question mind you what is that I gravitate towards some of us tend to have characters that Would be more suitable for one type of management team Structure or another and if you're a little more authoritative and and like to be in the forefront Certain types of power structure will definitely suit you better and you may feel more comfortable in now the expert power is based on knowledge that was the one that I told you that I like I respect

a lot of folks that have knowledge about things. I mean, it's not always they have power and money because of what they know that there's something to do. But I have a great deal of respect for people that know their subject matter and that put in the time to gain that. As far as somebody that has witnessed this type of power, reward power, who doesn't like reward? Anytime that we've been in a situation where we're being parented, that is probably where we run into reward power for the first time.

armando (10:00.499)
And we start learning that there is influence to be had if you hold the right amount of so to speak, to get a chore done whenever there are kiddos, not that you should eat your kiddos candy, but you understand the point. We learned this very young. We also learned the beginnings of what barter and trade is, and it starts the beginning of token commerce, if you will, and exchange to get things that we need and know will benefit us somehow. Now, this is something that on a thread,

on Facebook and I really enjoyed answering this talking about token economies wherever chimpanzees were given tokens to get bananas out of a monkey vending machine so to speak and They would be able to get whether it be grapes or bananas this sort of thing and often they would stash tokens they would hold back and Whenever they wanted favors from the females they would give them more tokens and they would go and feed their babies

Bananas and the grapes and stuff like that and they were more amenable towards the mail or the dominant mail that was holding the tokens at that point in time So there was definitely some exchange going on. It's not something unique to humans so there is power and recognition and this isn't necessarily dominance by strength and hierarchy, but rather recognizing the value the individual carries and also the benefit that we can gain by interacting with them and that is kind of like the the subtext of

what happens with power in that we have to interact with it. There's an exchange of some sort. What is it that we're exchanging to be able to interact with this power structure? Are we going to work with an authority and be an executor of certain actions under that authority? Maybe. Certain characters are really good for doing that. We note that some of the darker extremes would have been where people during war have executed people.

because they were just following orders and that somehow takes the individual and takes them out of the point of keeping them to account so to speak which doesn't work necessarily but it's an idea that keeps the blame off of them and sends it higher up if you will but in the bottom line sense we still have people that have been lost were lost as a result of somebody following orders and had they not they might have been executed so tough thing.

armando (12:23.753)
But something to think about once again about power structure. Now, referent power based on skill and liking, there are those that due to popularity are able to sway and influence. And we see a lot of this in the marketing that is directed towards us, where they get some of the people, our media personalities that we like from movies that aren't necessarily expert in certain areas that we like, but with product placement, this sort of thing in a movie, all of a sudden,

we start consuming those things whenever ET came out the very first time I remember this was when VHS was still a thing and those tapes and stuff whenever it hit the theaters the pieces the Reese's pieces came out at that time and that's how they marketed it whenever there were show clips and commercials and stuff with ET eating these things and it created an incredible surge in sales so that was an implied

use of power so to speak to increase marketing power they're selling to us but they use something that captured our imagination also captured our dollars mind you and this is where we see that larger than life character being used to ply in influence and that is power once again and what do we give up once again that's the question i have asked earlier didn't answer yet that is rather rhetorical but

What do give up to interact with that power structure to buy that bag of Reese's Pieces way back when and then all these kids were wanting them and how many of them were hollering at mom and dad, hey I want those and mom and dad finally are like, okay I'm done with this I'll go and get them some Reese's Pieces I'm tired of hearing this noise and then later on we realize mom and dad were sneaking their own bags of Reese's Pieces and that is kind of funny but we understand that there's influence that creates change and pushes the marketing

to the point that there is buying and exchange of goods and then there's an elevation of value, personal value in the social structure because, hey, I got Reese's Pieces too and you can talk about this with your friends and now we all kind of belong to the team or the tribe of Reese's Pieces consumers, this sort of thing. So there's a huge dynamic that is occurring there that is convoluted and it is powerful to say the least, but important to know. Now,

armando (14:45.109)
One of the other types of power I wanted to discuss as well was coercive power. The ability to punish, and this isn't something that is just aligned with corporate and business, but there are some that run businesses that way. But often whenever we deal with people that are punitive in an interpersonal sense, that they will make you pay for any little thing that you do. They'll make sure that you not only earn it, that you'll be hurting by the time you get to whatever your goal is.

I've trained with people in the martial arts that tend to like to do that, that even though they say they're training, they were going to get their licks in. And that's not a whole lot of fun to train, especially if you're really trying to develop yourself and help them develop. But they're stuck in the sense that everything that they do is all survival orientation, which means they can't take themselves out of that fight, flight, whatever got them to the point of that kind of anger and upset that could never let it down completely just to better themselves. So they were in areas where they could basically unload and...

and do things that were less than socially acceptable. But yet anyway, there are types that will make you pay every step of the way, they'll make you earn everything, and they may make it little harder for you. Now, the reason I mention this is that in my experience, and I am sharing some of my personal experience here without necessarily naming names, there are people that I've interacted with, and this happened in military quite a bit where people hold rank and they say the power goes to their head.

And the thing is, I don't think it's that the power goes to their head, it's just they don't know how to handle power. And there was something wrong with their head anyway, so I say it that way. And yes, I'm a therapist and know that wasn't particularly kind, but it makes the point. The idea is that there are those that once they get in a position of authority, they don't know how to act gracefully within that position and don't know how to grow into it, especially if they don't have a good mentor or guide to help them learn how to treat people. One, if they don't know how.

and also how to treat people if they do, whenever things are difficult without necessarily having to pull rank and quotes. And that's an important thing because much of that comes down to negotiation factor, being able to communicate well. And these are some important things about power. Any power type requires that you be able to communicate your way and your expectation and the ideas that are transmitted should be very clear. So that way the expectations aren't ambiguous.

armando (17:11.372)
There are many cultures that don't tolerate ambiguity very well. And there are many countries that do really well with structure and like the collectivistic perspective and expect people to kind of fall in line because it makes it better for everyone. And there's some benefit on both sides of that coin, so to speak, but ambiguity in the individual interpersonal sense can be very problematic. And if you're not aware that you're the one creating the ambiguity due to your lack of communication, then

You're shooting yourself in the foot and giving yourself reason if anything, if you're the punisher type, to give somebody a hard time when in actuality it really starts with you. So here's some important things. Whenever we're looking at communicating, trying to be concise and clear, absolutely important. Let people know what it is that you're trying to do and what you're trying to get to as far as a goal so they know how it is that they can help you better. So that is one of the most important things as far as the concise communication.

of what you want and what you want to get out of let's say a professional relationship. And if it's an interpersonal thing, letting people know what your boundaries are, this is okay, this is not okay. And what we're gonna do now after discussing types of power as far as what we'd call formal and informal power in interpersonal relationships, we're gonna talk about three types of physical power next. So in the Chinese martial arts, in Tai Chi in particular,

There are those that speak of types of power. We're not talking about anything mystical, energetic, even though it can involve that in some cases, but we're going to talk about the three types of power category. And the very first one is obvious power. And this would be physical dynamics, wherever you use musculature and skeletal structure to create force in the direction that you want to go. If you're either punching, kicking or pushing this sort of stuff or lifting for that matter. But this is the most obvious and also the most basic.

And it's also wherever you start. And this applies to development of self-regulation. What kind of obvious power am I applying in the sense that I'm intentionally doing something and I know that I'm doing it and I'm having to think my way through it. And this kind of ties into the conscious incompetence level where I'm learning. So obvious power, learning skill, these tend to go hand in hand. The next level of power is what's called the in obvious or the hidden power.

armando (19:37.502)
And this is where we start gaining skill and we become efficient. Not only that, we become effective at applying power. And this can be in verbiage, it can be physical, it can be by intent or timing. But whatever the deal is, we are able to do something more effectively and more skillfully such that it takes less energy for me to do things because I'm getting things right. And my structure is doing the work and I have less musculature doing work to do the work, so to speak. So that's

hidden power where things look more powerful simply because we're doing things where they're supposed to be and that we're in the martial art lens of self to becoming more masterful and effective at doing things that otherwise other methods do not work nearly as well because they're still very muscly oriented. The next level of power is mysterious power and mysterious power is often the part where things start getting kind of

wonky for some because people don't understand it but still they can feel the effects of it but they can't see the delivery of it. You might see an older person in the park doing tight sheet push hands and they just look like they're shrugging their shoulders but the structure is so refined that as the push comes in they root the force of the person's physical push coming in into the ground so quickly that they pulse their energy back once it hits the ground and bounces back through the structure that it seems like they're being shocked with electricity and bounce back.

nothing magical about it but the timing is superb and perfect but they call that mysterious power whenever we get really good at application of power interpersonally or in a physical sense often people don't know that it's going on and this is where we look at what's called mastery and grace and this is tied to the level of competency called conscious competency or unconscious competency rather the highest level

wherever we become so good at things that it looks like we're not doing anything at all. But yet we're still getting the job done and probably with less effort, if anything, and greater effect. So efficiency effectiveness, we are able to do what we do and we do it with less energy involved. We become incredibly efficient. Now, what does this have to do with self-regulation? It has a lot to do with it. In all things self-regulatory, whenever we're dealing with a high heartbeat, anxiety, for instance,

armando (21:58.524)
or even perception of stress, understanding that we have control of ourself and how we tend to perceive things. We can't control what's outside of us in our environment all the time. We can't to a degree, we can create change, but rarely do we have control of all things, especially those things that might make us nervous or stressed. And often when we feel disempowered is whenever we might feel more apt to lower our level of skill to something more physical and more brutish to get things done.

And Dr. Hawkins in his book, vs. Force, indicates that when we align with power, we become very powerful. That's like whenever we do in Tai Chi rooting, and now you're striking with the earth support behind you. Whereas if you're doing force, that means whatever muscularly you can generate is going to be the extent and the limit of the power you can develop. And that can be quite a bit, but if it's neutralized, then your root is broken and you can fall down while trying to do that. And it seems not only

clumsy but rather gross if anything. some things to pay attention to are, well, what kind of power do I like to wield? This is the question I'll leave you with. And is it okay to use it? Not all power is bad. And some people say that absolute power corrupts absolutely. I think that has to do with more with pre-existing character and potential tendencies prior to, but not always. I don't agree with that. Absolutely. And, but I will say that

There are certain temptations because there are certain things you can do with power that you can't do without it. So it can definitely be a very slippery slope. But for today, I just want to discuss types of power, physical power as it applies to physical pushing and martial art, this sort of thing, but also ideas on it and how it kind of impacts is not only in business, but interpersonally. And what do I align with? What kind of power structure do I find not only useful, but helpful?

in the way I deal with my life or maybe something that is maybe kind of a dark temptation that I like to use. joke with one of my sons that he has some Darth Vader tendencies and he does and I still remember that you know he's a kind-hearted loving individual but whenever things get pushed to a certain point he's got Darth Vader qualities and hey we have to recognize we all have that.

armando (24:19.756)
And we have to also realize that we have to embrace that and not shun it and treat it like it's something bad. Because otherwise then the power that we wield, if we have an opportunity to wield it or work with people using that, it can become very detrimental to not only relationships, but organizations and lives of people. So one thing is to be kind, two, be grateful, and three, be wise, be judicious in your application of power. Now,

If you have any questions for me, please send them to the Gmail at runningmangetskills at Gmail. I'd love to hear from you. And certainly we're moving towards the summer. It's getting warmer here in West Texas. And I'm hoping you can tell me how things are going in your part of the world. You take care. Walk well.