Whether you’re talking on the phone with a parent, texting your best friend, or spending time with your lover, power is present in all your interpersonal encounters. Power may be balanced (e.g., friend to friend) or imbalanced (e.g., manager to employee). When power is balanced, symmetrical relationships result. When power is imbalanced, complementary relationships are the outcome.

Although power is always present, we’re typically not aware of it until people violate our expectations for power balance in the relationship, such as giving orders or “talking down” to us. For example, your supervisor grabs inventory you were stocking and says, “No—do it this way!” even though you were doing it properly. According to Dyadic Power Theory (Dunbar, 2004), people with only moderate power are most likely to use controlling communication. Because their power is limited, they can’t always be sure they’re going to get their way. Hence, they feel more of a need to wield power in noticeable ways (Dunbar, 2004). In contrast, people with high power feel little need to display it; they know that their words will be listened to and their wishes granted. This means that you’re most likely to run into controlling communication and power-based bullying when dealing with people who have moderate amounts of power over you, such as mid-level managers, team captains, and class-project group leaders, as opposed to people with high power (in such contexts) like vice presidents, coaches, or faculty advisors.