The Power Paradox
- Rahul Kulkarni
- Nov 23
- 5 min read
Why meritocracy looks like favoritism from the outside.
(The Boss Paradox, Part 2)
The Preference No One Wanted to Name
At The Workshop, nobody talked openly about Rohit’s preferences.
(Suggestion: While this article can be read independently too without any loss of understanding, you may want to read 'The People Paradox' series to understand about 'The Workshop' ... our composite case study representative of common situations faced by growth-stage companies.)
They didn’t have to.
They felt it.
It started subtly ... who he brainstormed with, who he took into client calls, who he asked for “a quick second opinion” in the hallway.
Small signals.
Barely noticeable on their own.
But inside a growing team, small signals compound faster than official titles.
Two months after the “grand strategy town hall,” a new pattern had quietly taken over the place:
People weren’t trying to understand the strategy anymore.
They were trying to understand his proximity map.
Who does the boss trust?
Who does the boss listen to?
Who gets access without asking?
Whose mistakes get forgiven?
Whose opinions get amplified?
Rohit had no idea this was happening.
And that’s the paradox:
Every founder believes they run a meritocracy. Teams rarely experience it that way.
Inside a Growing Company, Power Is Not What the Boss Thinks It Is
Founders judge performance by outcomes.
Teams judge performance by patterns ... who gets visibility, who gets included, who gets defended.
That’s why even well-intentioned leaders accidentally create the feeling of favoritism.
At The Workshop, it wasn’t that Rohit “liked” someone more.
It was simpler:
He gravitated toward the people who understood him fastest.
Who could translate his half-sentence into action.
Who didn’t need emotional cushioning.
Who could keep up with his pace.
He wasn’t choosing favorites.
He was choosing ease.
But to everyone observing?
It felt like hierarchy within hierarchy → invisible, subjective, and unspoken.
Welcome to the Power Paradox:
A leader’s comfort looks like favoritism.
A team’s perception becomes culture.
The Moment the Team Stopped Competing Fairly
One Friday, during a sprint retro, something small shifted.
Aman suggested a bold workflow tweak.
It was smart.
Risky, but smart.
Before the team could weigh in, Rohit gently said,
“Let’s hold that thought. Meera, what do you think?”
No malice.
Just instinct.
Meera had worked with him the longest.
Her thinking pattern mirrored his.
He trusted her judgment.
But what the room heard was different:
Aman: “Why ask if my view doesn’t matter?”
Two interns: “So ideas go through Meera only?”
Ops lead: “Noted ... run anything ambitious through her first.”
Rohit didn’t promote a gatekeeper.
The team promoted one in their minds.
That’s how power works:
Perception outruns intention.
Pattern 1: The Favoritism Fog
In every company we’ve diagnosed, there’s a moment when meritocracy loses credibility ... not because leaders are unfair, but because the rules of recognition are invisible.
At The Workshop, people started whispering:
“Why does he always check with her first?”
“Is he grooming him for something?”
“Does he even know what the rest of us do?”
“So this is what ‘ownership’ actually means → proximity.”
The irony?
Rohit believed he was being completely transparent.
The team believed the opposite.
Not because of the outcomes ... but because of the patterns.
Pattern 2: The Founder Echo Chamber
This one hits harder because it’s universal.
Leaders think they’re open.
Teams think they’re careful.
Here’s the loop:
The boss shares half-baked ideas with the two people closest to him because it’s faster.
Those two people become the unofficial translators.
Everyone else becomes an observer, not a contributor.
The same two voices get louder in every meeting.
The boss gets addicted to their speed and clarity.
Everyone else slowly stops offering honest input.
At that point, you’re not running on insight.
You’re running on familiarity.
And familiarity is the most powerful and most dangerous currency in any growing business.
Pattern 3: The Corporate Sales Team Case Study
A few years ago, we worked with a national sales team where the VP insisted he was “fully meritocratic.”
His data said otherwise.
One top performer was invisible because he wasn’t a “talker.”
A mid-performer kept getting opportunities because she was confident, articulate, and always available.
A new joiner was ignored because he didn’t mirror the VP’s style.
When we ran blind ranking sessions, the VP was shocked.
He thought he was rewarding competence.
He was actually rewarding compatibility.
Most bosses do this without realizing it.
Teams notice before leaders do ... and once they do, morale doesn’t drop immediately.
It decays. Quietly.
Pattern 4: The Manufacturing Floor Example
On a manufacturing line we studied, a supervisor unintentionally promoted the wrong person .. three times.
Not because he was biased.
Because:
he trusted the one person who agreed with him,
avoided the one who questioned him, and
undervalued the quiet person who actually ran the shift.
When we interviewed workers, one line worker said:
“It’s simple.
We all know who will get picked.
Performance is for the reports.
Trust is for the promotions.”
That sentence should be printed on every founder’s wall.
So What’s Really Going On?
Here’s the uncomfortable truth:
Leaders don’t reward favoritism. They reward familiarity, comfort, speed, and trust ... all of which are invisible to the team.
But because leaders rarely articulate why they trust someone, the team fills in the blanks:
“He’s close to the boss.”
“She gets away with anything.”
“The rules are different for him.”
“I guess we all know who gets promoted next.”
This is how high-performing, well-meaning teams lose belief in meritocracy.
Once that belief goes, performance isn’t the first casualty.
Initiative is.
Why take risks when the outcome is already “decided”?
Why stretch when proximity matters more than contribution?
Why try when alignment beats capability?
Favoritism isn’t a behavior.
It’s an experience.
And experiences define culture.
The Real Paradox
The boss thinks they’re being objective.
The team thinks the boss is being selective.
Both are right.
Power isn’t about intention.
Power is about impact.
And impact is shaped by patterns the boss rarely sees — because they’re too close to themselves.
That’s The Power Paradox:
The more senior you become, the less accurately you see how your choices are interpreted.
KEY CONCEPTS
1. Favoritism Fog
The perception that leaders have favorites due to repeated proximity, not explicit bias.
2. Proximity Power
The invisible advantage gained simply by being closer ... physically, emotionally, cognitively ... to the boss.
3. Founder Echo Chamber
A loop where leaders hear filtered or familiar voices, mistaking comfort for competence.
4. Familiarity Bias
The unconscious preference for people who resemble the leader’s decision-making style.
5. Interpretive Hierarchy
Teams building their own internal map of “who matters” based on observed access, not official structure.
FAQs
Q1. Does favoritism always mean the boss is biased?
No. Most favoritism is accidental as a result of comfort, speed, shared vocabulary, or history.
Q2. Why do teams detect favoritism faster than leaders?
Because teams observe patterns from the outside. Leaders live inside them.
Q3. Can meritocracy exist in small companies?
Yes, but only when the criteria for trust, recognition, and opportunity are explicit and consistent.
Q4. Why do founders lean on a “core inner circle”?
Because it reduces cognitive load.
But it creates cultural distortion when it becomes the only source of truth.
Q5. Is this fixable?
Absolutely.
But this series isn’t about remedies, rather it’s about clarity.
Solutions come later.
Read more deep-dive insights at www.ppsconsulting.biz/blog.
(PPS Consulting helps organizations scale without chaos through structure, governance, and people systems that grow with their teams. Views are institutional.)
The Boss Paradox series:
The Communication Gap - What bosses think they’ve said… and what teams actually hear.
The Power Paradox - Why meritocracy looks like favoritism from the outside.
The Pace & Pressure Paradox - How a founder’s natural speed becomes the team’s chronic anxiety.
The Boundary Collapse - When kindness becomes micromanagement and autonomy becomes fear.
The System Distortion - How unofficial influence quietly bends the system teams think they’re operating in.
Well, I could relate to almost all the paradoxes during various assignments in my career. Could not have captured it better.
What was even more awesome was the submission is that the article is for clarity not remedies.
I am sure there would not be a straight theorem or equation (like a chemical equation) to be remedies for the situations