Skip to Content
How to Communicate Successfully: The Halvorson Collection (2 Books)
book

How to Communicate Successfully: The Halvorson Collection (2 Books)

by Heidi Grant Halvorson
October 2015
Beginner
336 pages
4h 49m
English
Harvard Business Review Press
Content preview from How to Communicate Successfully: The Halvorson Collection (2 Books)

Chapter 5

The Power Lens

There’s a passage by English humorist Douglas Adams that always comes to mind when I think about the power lens. In Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency, Adams writes about horses:

They have always understood a great deal more than they let on. It is difficult to be sat on all day, every day, by some other creature, without forming an opinion about them.

On the other hand, it is perfectly possible to sit all day, every day, on top of another creature and not have the slightest thought about them whatsoever.1

What Adams correctly noted, with his characteristic insightfulness and humor, is that power changes how we see one another—assuming we see one another at all.

Just as the trust lens is worn when perceivers are ...

Become an O’Reilly member and get unlimited access to this title plus top books and audiobooks from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers, thousands of courses curated by job role, 150+ live events each month,
and much more.

Read now

Unlock full access

More than 5,000 organizations count on O’Reilly

AirBnbBlueOriginElectronic ArtsHomeDepotNasdaqRakutenTata Consultancy Services

QuotationMarkO’Reilly covers everything we've got, with content to help us build a world-class technology community, upgrade the capabilities and competencies of our teams, and improve overall team performance as well as their engagement.
Julian F.
Head of Cybersecurity
QuotationMarkI wanted to learn C and C++, but it didn't click for me until I picked up an O'Reilly book. When I went on the O’Reilly platform, I was astonished to find all the books there, plus live events and sandboxes so you could play around with the technology.
Addison B.
Field Engineer
QuotationMarkI’ve been on the O’Reilly platform for more than eight years. I use a couple of learning platforms, but I'm on O'Reilly more than anybody else. When you're there, you start learning. I'm never disappointed.
Amir M.
Data Platform Tech Lead
QuotationMarkI'm always learning. So when I got on to O'Reilly, I was like a kid in a candy store. There are playlists. There are answers. There's on-demand training. It's worth its weight in gold, in terms of what it allows me to do.
Mark W.
Embedded Software Engineer

You might also like

HBR Management Tips Collection (2 Books)

HBR Management Tips Collection (2 Books)

Harvard Business Review
HBR Working Dads Collection (6 Books)

HBR Working Dads Collection (6 Books)

Harvard Business Review, Daisy Dowling

Publisher Resources

ISBN: 9781633691612