in the driver's seat

Idioms  

1. Also, in the saddle. In control, in a position of authority. For example, With the boss on vacation, Mr. Burns was in the driver's seat and enjoying it, or She waited until after the election, knowing that she'd be in the saddle then. The first expression dates from the 1800s, the second from the early 1600s. Also see at the helm.

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Example Sentences

“The appointment of Brandon Craig at BHP is effectively like putting the chief engineer of the ‘copper engine’ in the driver’s seat,” he says.

From The Wall Street Journal

She nods to where a neatly mustachioed man sits in the driver’s seat of an automobile on the street.

From Literature

Stick shifts are also slower than their auto-shifted counterparts from 0-60 mph—due to the fleshy, fallible widgets sitting in the driver’s seat.

From The Wall Street Journal

Friday’s bond-market moves are “screaming that job and growth fears are in the driver’s seat. The catalyst is pretty obvious: It is the great AI scare, which jumped a firewall from being a tech-sector story to being a macro story,” Ahn said in a phone interview.

From MarketWatch

According to Tesla’s marketing materials for Autopilot and Full Self-Drive mode, “the system is designed to be able to conduct short and long-distance trips with no action required by the person in the driver’s seat.”

From Los Angeles Times