Does who we are inform how we are?
When working with clients, we often say that “Presence is the first act of leadership.” What we mean by this is that how we show up cognitively, emotionally and physically informs how we lead in organizations. Presence is an expression of what we are paying attention to at any given moment, it describes how we occupy the space around us. At Conversant, we say that presence is awareness without prejudice, meaning it is to be attuned to what’s happening without censoring or judging what we are thinking, feeling, or sensing. The three domains of presence, cognitive, emotional, and physical, don’t exist in a vacuum and don’t represent the only ways in which we experience life. Presence is deeply influenced by two other important factors, our bioreactions—our instinctual fight, flight, freeze, or appease responses—and our identity. Identity is defined as the traits, characteristics and experiences that inform how you see yourself and how you are seen. Said differently, identity is part perception, part performance, and all real.
I recently went to see the movie Wicked with a friend who also loved the book by Gregory McGuire and the Broadway musical, and we both loved the soundtrack before we’d ever even seen the show. Large tub of buttered popcorn in hand, we settled in to take in the film. As anticipated, Cynthia Erivo’s soaring performance of “Defying Gravity,” as Elphaba brought me to tears and my friend and I sat glued to our seats long after the credits rolled, trading observations and insights. Among the things I noted about Elphaba’s character, and how she knew she was perceived in the film, was her presence. On more than one occasion, she introduced herself to new people, emphasizing her green skin, “Okay let’s get this over with, no I’m not seasick, yes, I’ve always been green. No, I didn’t eat grass as a child.” It struck me that the intersection of her identity (someone who identifies as and is perceived as green), her presence (what she is paying attention to), and her sense of power all meet in that moment to create a sense of both who she thinks she is and who she thinks others think she is. This is of course made more nuanced by the fact that Cynthia Erivo, the actress who portrays Elphaba, the story’s central character, is Black. What additional complexity did it bring to the portrayal of a character, whose tale we are meant to understand as a villain’s origin story? It left me wondering about the relationship between identity and power and how it is – and isn’t – expressed.
As they swept up popcorn kernels around us, we dove into the obvious themes of self-discovery, friendship/allyship and social status, but also who Elphaba got to be at any given moment in the film. Emotional presence is our ability to pay attention, and respond genuinely, to our and others’ emotions. However, when we experience bioreactions like fear or anxiety, our cognitive presence can become impaired. Cognitive presence refers to our ability to be present with our thoughts and to engage effectively with information. Fear and anxiety, which are often triggered by real and perceived threats, can cause us to disconnect emotionally. In addition, when we feel threatened, our ability to think clearly or process complex ideas may be compromised. Bioreactions like flight (the urge to retreat) or appease (the instinct to defer to others to avoid conflict) can even impact our physical presence—posture, body language, etc. When we feel comfortable, and are held in the complexity of our identity, we are fully present and hold may hold their physical space confidently, making their presence more impactful.
The relationship between identity and power is complex, and often fraught.
Our relationship to power is closely tied to our identity—shaped by our culture, gender, race, socioeconomic status, and other factors. Power, in organizations, is often seen only as something related to title or position—but power is far more nuanced than that. It is intricately connected to our sense of identity and our ability to navigate and express our presence in various situations. Understanding how identity interacts with different forms of power—role or position, information, and how you’re perceived—can radically shift how we engage with others. Equally important is understanding how our presence in cognitive, emotional, and physical domains affects our ability to exercise that power.
Power is our ability or capacity to direct or influence others’ behavior, or their experiences, or to drive the course of events and often position power, or formal authority or a recognized role, are the only ways in which it is observed. But power also includes access to valuable information, and the ways you’re viewed based on your expertise, affiliations or relationships. Position power isn’t just about the role you hold in organizations, but also includes your ability to control resources, require compliance with rules or policies, and most notably your decision-making ability (both as the decision-maker and as someone who defers decision-making to others.) Jeffrey Pfeffer once said, “Power [is] the ability to get things done your way in contested situations.” He goes on to say, “Different people and different functions will have different perspectives, different information, and different points of view. Almost every decision is going to be somewhat contested, so power is the ability to get your way in contested situations.” In the case of marginalized identities, the ability to leverage position power can often be limited by external societal forces or other implicit or unexpressed biases in an organization, some of the differences Pfeffer notes. Said differently, just because a person has position power based on role or title, doesn’t mean that others will respond accordingly, undermining the validity of that position power.
While position power is limited to some people in organizations, information power is available to many more. Those who possess valuable, exclusive, or unique knowledge often and do wield considerable influence, whether they are in roles of formal authority. To view this through the lens of identity, someone whose experience differs widely from others in a community, group or organization might have access to information or insights that challenge dominant narratives or historic ways of doing things, but they may not always be heard or believed. Information power depends not just on the possession of knowledge, but also how valuable that information is to the people around you. Given this, it makes sense that identity plays a significant role in how information is accessed, processed, and valued. One’s identity may very well influence the perceived value and validity of that knowledge and the audience’s receptivity to that knowledge.
Feminist scholar bell hooks highlights this in her work on intersectionality, stating, “To be oppressed means to be a member of a group whose reality, experiences, and perspectives are consistently devalued, dismissed, and invalidated by those in [position] power. This has a direct link to credibility. We define credibility power as expertise and credentials, as well as valuable associations or relationships. But more importantly, credibility includes your reliability for having a high-quality conversation by listening from a place of curiosity and desire for alignment. Unfortunately, some identities are often disempowered when it comes to being trusted, respected or relevant based on their different expertise, affiliations or associations. It creates additional pressure to source credibility through conversation – high quality, timely conversations – to generate curiosity in others. In some cases, overcoming bias must happen before curiosity shows up. Which brings us back to the Queen of Green, Elphaba, and why she might lead in her introductions to people with explanations about why she is green.
Who we are is connected to how we’re able to access and express emotion.
In the penultimate scene of the film, Elphaba is confronted with the realization that her choice not to comply with the Wiz’s plans to use magic to control and subjugate animals in Oz will result in her isolation and vilification. She stands in the center of the dusty room, listening to an announcement over Oz’s loudspeaker defaming her character, asserting falsehoods about her actions–sealing her fate as an enemy of the most powerful person in Oz, and of the very people she was hoping to serve in partnership with the Wiz. We watch her facial expressions shift from terror, to shock, to resignation and finally to resolve. In that moment, she decides her only recourse is to leave Oz, abandoning her idealist dreams for her and its future, and recognizing that the relationships she’d built along the way hinged upon her doing as she was told, offering her magic (her source of power) in service of something she couldn’t or wouldn’t support. As social psychologist Robert Sapolsky notes, “It is not our nature to be one thing; it is our nature to be a reaction.” In this sense, how we respond to these bioreactions—and how they are shaped by our identities—determines how present we can be in any given situation. And how we and our presence is perceived is not entirely up to us; our bioreactions are deeply linked to identity. Donna Hicks writes,
“The emotional volatility associated with having our dignity honored or violated cannot be overstated. When people feel that their value and worth are recognized in their relationships, they experience a sense of well-being that enables them to grow and flourish. If in contrast, their dignity is routinely injured, relationships are experienced as a source of pain and suffering.”
Elphaba, a doting elder sister, model student, and aspiring servant leader is crushed in that moment as she realizes that she isn’t as credible or as powerful as she thought. It is heartbreaking to watch the revelation take place. But Elphaba doesn’t just decide to leave Oz. At this point she has pleaded with the Wizard, with her mentor Madame Morrible and has exhausted the possibility of meaningful conversation with them both. As she realizes she will not be safe is she stays in Oz, she decides to leave, inviting Glinda to join her and build something new together. Glinda declines, offering Elphaba a cape instead of her continued companionship, and concretizes the reality that Elphaba will need to take on whatever happens next alone. Despite this realization, and betrayal, she smiles and winks at Glinda through glassy eyes, shedding silent tears, conveying both deep hurt and an understanding of Glinda’s limitations to be fully present then and in the future. In this scene, we see both characters restricted in some way, unable to fully express what they are each present to in that moment. Limited emotional presence impacts total presence and undermines our access to all forms of power.
People with marginalized identities are often in exceedingly challenging social and professional situations but also socialized to suppress or internalize certain bioreactions due to societal expectations that would be appropriate for those situations. For example, women and people of color are sometimes taught to appease or avoid confrontation, particularly in personal and professional relationships and in public forums. This decision not to express the things that would generate shared insight, forces some to leave power and possible shared value on the table. Brittney Cooper writes,
“Power is not attained from books and seminars. Not alone, anyway. Power is conferred by social systems. Empowerment and power are not the same thing. We must quit mistaking the two. Better yet, we must quit settling for one when what we really need is the other.”
When we are fully present, we are unlimited.
Elphaba’s story is one that has long resonated with readers and viewers who have felt othered in whatever context they’ve found themselves. It is a story that examines the central paradox presented in Cooper’s assertion re the difference between being empowered and the reality of being in power of being the story told versus being the storyteller. In a future post, we’ll dig deeper into the consequences of limited presence, the urgency of emotional agility in an increasingly complex workplace, and the impact on vitality. In the meantime, an essential question we might ask ourselves is “What is the impact of my ability to be purposefully present, aware without my or other’s prejudice, on by ability to access power?”
