Let’s set the scene.

Bella’s 28, bright-eyed, quietly ambitious, and just a bit too polite for her own good. She’s a project coordinator at a sleek tech firm where the coffee is artisanal, the deadlines are brutal, and the real work isn’t just in deliverables. It’s in learning how to read a room, navigate a meeting, and survive the silent power plays that decide everything.

This is a day in her life. One of those days where nothing dramatic happens, yet you walk away feeling like you lost something. Or maybe you just weren’t allowed to win.

And that, my friend, is power doing its quiet little dance. Because power has three faces.

1. The Obvious No: Visible Power

It’s 9:48 AM. Bella is leading the weekly team meeting with a sparkle in her eyes and a carefully curated slide deck in hand. She’s pitching a low-effort, high-impact idea. A mental health Slack channel. Just some check-ins, resource sharing, and good vibes.

Halfway through her pitch, her manager Tom cuts in with a perfectly timed, “Let’s not dilute our focus. We have Q3 targets to meet. Maybe next quarter.”

The room goes quiet. Someone coughs. Another sips their coffee. Bella swallows her disappointment, nods, and moves on.

That’s visible power. Clear, direct, and impossible to misinterpret. A decision has been made. Someone wins. Someone doesn’t.

2. The Pretty Redirect: Covert Power

By lunchtime, Bella is in a roundtable with HR. The topic is engagement. The vibe is surface-level optimism.

Bella gently raises a bigger issue. She’s noticed the lack of diversity in leadership and offers a soft suggestion. “Maybe we could introduce a mentorship program to support underrepresented staff?”

The facilitator smiles kindly. “Let’s stay focused on performance metrics today. That topic deserves its own session.”

The discussion moves on. Bella’s idea disappears.

This is covert power. The quiet kind that doesn’t argue or confront. It simply redirects. The issues that matter never get space. And the people who notice are left wondering if they imagined it all.

3. The Quiet Guilt Trip: Institutional Power

At 6:17 PM, Bella is still at her desk. No one told her to stay late. But she doesn’t feel right leaving while others are still typing away.

She thinks of her friend who left at five once and got called “checked out” during performance reviews. She remembers how praise always goes to the ones who “go the extra mile.” So she stays.

This is institutional power. It doesn’t need meetings or memos. It lives in culture. In vibes. In the collective pressure to perform. Bella stays because she’s learned that’s what gets rewarded. She stays because it’s easier than leaving and being judged.

So… What Just Happened?

Bella wasn’t yelled at. She didn’t get into a fight. No rules were broken.

But in one regular day:

• She got shut down (visible power)
• She got redirected (covert power)
• She stayed late without being asked (institutional power)

If you’ve ever felt invisible in a meeting, guilty for taking a break, or exhausted without knowing why, you’ve already met these three faces of power.

Why It Matters

The strongest systems don’t tell you what to do. They make you want to do it. They don’t silence you with force. They smile and change the topic. They don’t chain you to your desk. They just make it uncomfortable to leave.

But once you learn to spot power in its subtle forms, you start asking better questions.

Who gets to speak?
What ideas never make it onto the agenda?
Why does it feel risky to be yourself at work?

Power isn’t just a top-down thing. It’s in the stories we’re told. The values we adopt. The little moments that train us to shrink.

TL;DR:

🧠 Power has three faces:

1. Visible – the obvious “yes” or “no”
2. Covert – what’s politely pushed aside
3. Institutional – the things we internalise as normal

🎯 Lesson: You don’t need a villain to feel powerless. Sometimes all it takes is a smile, a nod, and a culture that rewards silence.