A Word to the Wise
Developing Authority through Experience
As builders, we are a central node on a sprawling web of relationships and details, and our primary role is to integrate. We integrate through authority. We cannot fulfill our role if we do not operate from a position of altitude and leadership. Failing this, the authoritative center node and organizing principal becomes a logistical blip.
I define authority as the position and decision-making power held by a reliable, credible, wise, knowledgeable and experienced person. True authority is inherent and self-evident.
Often a client will ask for a recommendation: what would you do here? This might be a question about chair rail heights or how much they should spend on insulation. These are questions directed to our experience and expertise. If a client is asking these questions, they have recognized that you are an authority on the matter. From countless options, they’re asking you to present just a few based on your wisdom. They’re asking you to make a decision on which options to propose and which to leave unsaid. In some cases, a client may say, “I trust you on this one, whatever you think is best.” Whether or not the client leaves it all up to you or not, they are recognizing and acknowledging your natural authority (de facto) and granting you functional authority (de juris) over their project and decision-making.
Authority does not mean dictatorship. It does not mean all-knowing, and it most definitely does not mean all-powerful. The word derives from a Roman principal and political privilege granted to certain leaders, auctoritas. Some military leaders possessed it; senators possessed it. The Roman statesman Cicero wrote, “While power resides in the people, authority rests with the Senate.” People have power (potestes), but not necessarily authority because not all people have the qualifications of authority. Authority was not limitless either. Authority had a defined scope. The Roman emperor consequently didn’t need auctoritas; he had imperium, yet another kind of power which, while also limited, was superior.
Having determined that we need authority to be successful, how do we go about acquiring it? Well, simply, you can’t. You can not acquire authority. We recognize that someone who’s been an apprentice for two years, is not qualified to answer our chair rail question. Why not? Well first, they aren’t an authority on chair rail. They lack the knowledge and experience to be considered an expert and therefore they are not a reliable or credible source of information on the subject of moulding! Authority is a consequence of other qualities, qualities we can acquire.
At the deepest level it is a question of wisdom. First comes knowledge; knowledge is facts acquired. These can be taught or learned independently. With experience, the knowledge develops into wisdom. Inherent to wisdom is the knowledge that you can’t know everything, and you must learn how to learn. Armed with wisdom we can make decisions about things outside of our expertise and knowledge. (because x is usually true I can assume y might be true). Wisdom gives us confidence (well, I don’t know the code for that, but I’m confident I know how to find it). Confidence is as much an outward quality as an inward one; we can generally suss out when someone knows what they are talking about or not, and the truly wise will even let us know they don’t know (you know I’m not 100% certain on that but let me do some research and get back to you). Confidence is the quality possessed by experts and the experienced.
While people with authority are experts, by my own definition, they aren’t experts on everything, but we trust them regardless. If we watch a talking head on the news deliver a point, but the counter point is delivered by someone with “M.D” after their name, we will naturally trust the doctor more, even if the conversation has nothing to do with medicine. It may turn out that that doctor is a quack, but regardless, we have an implicit trust towards experts.
There is also the matter of false authority. There are leaders out there operating from a supposed position of authority from which they believe all their other qualities must emanate. I am in charge, and therefore I am right, and I know what’s best. Authority is not a self-awarded mantle. It is something earned through personal development which manifests through external acknowledgment, that is, recognition by others of the qualities within that demonstrate authority. The false authority does not possess authority in the true sense, they merely make the rules.
Becoming a true authority takes years. Over time as knowledge expands with new experience, small tranches of authority are handed over. If we return to our apprentice, we can suggest that in year two, they may truly be an authority on baseboard; in year 3, crown moulding; in year four, door hanging, and so on. As they grow so does their authority.