Power makes people ‘more likely to lie, to cheat, to swear’ at work, experts say

You can’t see or smell power.

But with enough practice, it’s easy to recognise who has it and who doesn’t — especially when you’re the one without it.

Social psychologist Professor Dacher Keltner, from the University of California, Berkley, has talked to thousands of people about power. He’s studied it for 25 years.

He says most of us consider power in terms of work, money or prestige.

However what power really comes down to, he says, is your “capacity to alter the state of another person … their thoughts, their feelings, their actions, their pocketbook, their health”.

So how do you attain power? Why can it be so easy to lose, but so hard to give up?

Getting power

Professor Keltner says in many workplaces gaining power and rising in the…