Co-Powerment
Co-powerment is communication that seeks to lift the confidence, energy and agency of another person, self, and the relationship.
Every day we energize our own power to achieve what is important to ourselves and those we love – like personal success and improved communities. It’s equally important that we interact to co-power family, friends, co-workers, and community because we desire their success and we also want to accomplish good things together.
Years ago I coined the term, “co-powerment” to create mindfulness for a practice that would be more collaborative than the hierarchical relationships often implied by the idea of “empowerment.” Thus, co-powerment is communication that seeks to lift the confidence, energy and agency of another person, self, and the relationship. It is lifting the power of self and others.
The better we become at co-powering, the more we grow deeper relationships that develop our power to create positive personal, family, and community change. Together with others, we grow the movement to advance a world of love and respect.
Over the years, I have received numerous inspirational stories and requests prompting me to deepen my understanding and possibly prepare a practical book on co-powerment that would illustrate its practice and potentials.
One of my clients is Cabrillo Economic Development Corporation, a premier California housing development organization. Their Community Building manager, Kathryn Benner, shared with me the effect of co-powerment in her work: “The idea of co-powerment has tremendously influenced me, our department, and programs,” says Kathryn. “It helped me make a radical shift in how I see my work and the communities we work for: instead of focusing on deficits, seeing the many potentials.”
Kathryn continued to share several stories about the application of co-powerment as a guiding principle and a source for innovation within her organization’s work relationships, programs and strategies. One of her examples took place during a recent community mural project.
More than a dozen young people between 11 and 25 years old spent their Saturday making house calls to get residents out for a community meeting. At the end of the day, inspired by the idea of co-powerment, Kathryn’s colleague called the youth together to participate in an honoring circle.
The organizer expressed her gratitude for their accomplishments and invited the youth to take a few minutes to recognize in each other the value they had brought to the project. One by one the youth were able to offer each other the gifts of positive feedback. The immediate outcome was an energy lift for all participants and concrete example of how they could positively support each other. Kathryn’s team was able to continue building on this experience to strengthen the bonds among a number of the youth and their commitment to community involvement.
My vision is to prepare a book designed for activists, organizers, parents, teachers and students that illustrates the power of co-powerment for connecting self and others to their power for agency, learning, growth and love.
I would appreciate to hear about how you as activists and leaders are using or experimenting with the concept of co-powerment and developing this practice.
If the concept of co-powerment or co-powering communication has been of value to you or if you have been involved in any creative or unique co-powering activity within your relationships, family, organization or community, I’d love to hear about it in the comments below or contact me at vargas.copowerment@gmail.com.
I look forward to keep you current on my learning and progress. Many thanks!
A long-time trainer for Rockwood, Roberto is an educator, community organizer and organizational consultant. He provides leadership development, team building and strategic planning services primarily to organizations engaged in advocacy, community service, empowerment and social change.
tags: Co-Powerment, Roberto Vargas
Posted by AdrienneTorf on Jan 11th, 2013
Thank you for introducing the concept of Co-Power, Roberto. During the Art of Leadership I participated in, a group of us had a vibrant discussion about Co-Power and how it compares to / contrasts with with Collaborative Power. One take-away was that, in order to be fully effective, Co-Power requires an explicit agreement among the people involved that it’s being practiced. Any thoughts on that?
Posted by Roberto Vargas on Jan 16th, 2013
Thanks for your thoughts.
We might consider co-powerment and collaborative power as overlapping dynamics of proactive leadership. Proactive leaderships seeks to advance the vision of positive change. Within this context collaborative power focuses on the communications involved in developing and advancing collaboration, whereas the idea of co-powerment intends to increase mindfulness of our responsibility to support the optimal development of others. I believe as leaders and organizers our intent should be to continually seek to lift the self-confidence, courage, skill-development and positive energy of others. This is co-powerment.
We don’t necessarily need permission to be a positive force that inspires and co-powers others. We can lift others by providing recognition, affirmation, feedback, asking strategic questions, or even offering a smile. As a relationship develops, I would agree that the”lift potential” becomes stronger as we develop explicit agreements to support each other through our communication, observations and feedback. For example, a recent client was actively involved in developing the capacity of one his colleagues. He saw himself engaged in co-powerment. Subsequently he hired her to serve as his deputy. They immediately developed their list of mutual expectations which outlined how they were going to collaborate and also consciously seek to support each other’s development and success (co-powerment)
Posted by Nathaniel James on Feb 5th, 2013
This article came at a perfect time to remind me of the co-powering framework. I would look forward to a book! This is coming just as I’m at the early stages of developing an organization that I hope many people can use as a platform in their social change, impact and creative endeavors. Co-powering seems to be part of the language I need to make that happen. Please keep me posted.
Posted by Nathaniel James on Feb 5th, 2013
I’ve also shared this post with some networks to get people thinking.
Posted by Nathaniel James on Feb 5th, 2013
Ok, one more comment for the day.
I’d like to hear more about the strategic benefits of a “power with” approach over a “power over” approach. For example, “power over” will leave a trail of resentful people behind a leader, whereas “power with” can build a network of reciprocity. “Power over” will guarantee that secrets are kept from the leader; “power with” opens the opportunity for mutual disclosure. I could share cases for these, if it’s helpful in your writing.
I think laying out the productive advantages of co-powering will make the case that this isn’t simply about “being nice.”
Posted by Inez Gonzalez on Feb 7th, 2013
Roberto, it’s great to read your post. We all could use more co-power. Your post made me think about how I can be more intentional about co-powering family, friends, colleagues and even strangers. I look forward to reading your book and learning how I can put co-power into daily practice. I know that I do practice it when I’m mentoring, being a good friend, or practicing good management but I’d like to get to the point where I co-power without the need for “formal” setting. I want to make it more of a daily practice. Thanks for the challenge!
Posted by Maria on Mar 16th, 2013
I love this article Roberto! Thank you for sharing your knowledge and thoughtfulness with us. I have used your book and your teachings to enhance my understanding of co-powering. I especially like how you’ve distinguished it from “empowerment” – that is a very useful differentiation.
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