Power is one of the marks of public success in today's world. We all know about power because we have experienced it, whether we were on the giving end or the receiving end. Power is difficult to define because it comes in so many different shapes and sizes.

The very word power elicits different emotional responses in each of us. How we respond to power depends on who happens to have the power, as well as how it is used. Power includes the ability to influence, to choose, to help, and to change. Each one of us has some type of power, at least in some places or under some circumstances.

Power also comes in the form of power over another, which may be that of an employer over an employee, a parent over a child, a teacher over a student, or a government official over a people. Leo Tolstoy o…