I want to start this year with a commitment. To speak and write more about power and power awareness. Not power as an abstract idea or academic concept, but power as something we live with every day. In our bodies, in our relationships, in our communities, and in our workplaces. Power that can harm and power that can protect. Power that can be shared, and power that causes damage when it goes unnamed.
My hope is that through this writing, we can start building more power-aware spaces together. From community circles to workplaces, from grassroots organising to organisational leadership. Spaces where power works for us rather than the other way around.
So I want to begin with a phrase I hear all the time. A well-intentioned invitation. A myth, really. An illusion dressed up as inclusivity.
“Let’s leave job titles at the door.”
I hear it in workshops, in team away days, in community spaces, trying to feel less hierarchical and more human. And every time I hear it, a part of me tenses, because I know what usually follows.
The intention is usually good. It’s meant to flatten hierarchies, to give everyone an equal voice, to make the space feel less formal and more human. But saying “leave job titles at the door” doesn’t actually make power disappear. Most of the time, it does the opposite. It pushes power underground, where it becomes harder to name, harder to challenge, and harder to hold accountable.
Power doesn’t vanish just because we decide not to talk about it.
Titles are symbols, yes, but they are attached to very real systems. Systems of decision making, access, consequence, and control. When a CEO and a junior staff member sit in the same circle, they are not carrying the same level of risk, no matter how cosy or informal the room feels.
One person can speak freely, knowing their position is secure. The other may be weighing every word, aware that what they say could shape how they are perceived, treated, or promoted at work. Declaring the space equal doesn’t change that reality. Pretending otherwise isn’t just naïve. It can be unsafe.
What often goes unspoken is who this request actually serves.
Those with privilege, whether that’s seniority, whiteness, class, gender, or able-bodiedness, can afford to forget their title. The world continues to recognise their authority regardless. Those with less power don’t have that luxury. They carry the consequences in their bodies, their nervous systems, and their employment prospects.
So when we say “leave your title at the door”, what we are really asking some people to do is to suspend their awareness of risk and behave as if the playing field is level. That’s not an invitation to equality. It’s pressure to silence those with less power for the comfort of others.
And this is where equality and equity often get tangled.
Ignoring differences doesn’t create fairness. It just obscures it. Equity asks a harder question. How do we design a space where people with less power can participate fully without putting themselves at risk? And how do we ensure that those with more power are conscious of the weight they carry, rather than pretending it isn’t there?
There is also something else that gets lost when we erase titles. Accountability.
Titles don’t only confer privilege. They carry responsibility. When someone with positional power speaks in a room, their words land differently because they have the ability to influence policy, budgets, priorities, and culture. If we strip that context away, we also strip away responsibility. And without accountability, change stays theoretical.
For people who have experienced systemic oppression, being asked to ignore power dynamics can cut even deeper. It can echo years of being told not to name what is obvious, not to make things uncomfortable, not to point at the structures shaping their lives. In some cases, it can even be re-traumatising. Once again, reality is being smoothed over for the sake of surface harmony.
So no, the answer isn’t to pretend power doesn’t exist.
The work is to name it. Gently, clearly, without shaming or theatrics. To acknowledge that people arrive in rooms carrying different levels of safety, agency, and influence. To design conversations that don’t rely on the most confident or powerful voices to set the tone. To remind those with titles that their role doesn’t disappear in a circle. It asks for more care, not less.
When I facilitate, I’m not interested in performative flatness. I’m interested in spaces where power is visible enough to be held well. Where people are invited to notice how their role and identity shape how they speak and how they listen. Where leaders understand that influence comes with responsibility, not entitlement.
So let’s stop asking people to leave their job titles at the door. It’s not the shortcut to equality it’s often sold as. Also, safety doesn’t come from denial. It comes from naming power, holding it with care, and actively working to rebalance it.
That’s what makes a space liberatory rather than performative, and that’s where real transformation begins.
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