Follower’s First 

 The case for promoting follower-ship at workplace

Importance of Leadership:

It is a self-evident truth that businesses need good leadership if they are to succeed. Yet despite the key role they play in corporate life, business leaders are under growing pressure today both domestically and internationally. Leaders are being criticized for not producing desired organizational outcomes and in many cases they do not have the trust of major stakeholders such as shareholders and employees. 

It takes two to tango!

One approach to this leadership crisis is to revisit our established notions of leadership and to try to identify any changes to existing thinking that might lead to an increase in the effectiveness of business leaders in particular. Leadership can be seen to be a two-way interaction between “those who lead” and “those who follow” in pursuit of common objectives and tangible and observable outcomes. In this interactive model of leadership, leader and follower are two separate concepts, two separate roles. In a perfect world, they are “complementary” and not competitive roles. “Trust” is the glue that binds the leader and the follower.

Why Leadership Fixation?

If we ask this candid question to ourselves - Would I like to have any of these designations printed on my business card? Viz. Team “Follower”? Project “Follower”? Senior Project “Follower”? If one has to answer honestly, most probably it will be an emphatic NO!

Because we all are “hard-wired” or “conditioned” to be obsessed with “hero (heroine)” worship basis constant hammering since childhood viz.

• ·         Leaders are more important than followers.
• ·         Leaders (should) know more than followers.
• ·         A leader has bright future, a follower doesn’t.
• ·         Following is simply doing what you’re told.

 We typically resist being “a follower” because –

• ·         Confusion between follower as “personality type” and follower as “role”.
• ·         Lack of positive models of follower-ship.

What is a follower?

Simply put - “Follower” is a role, when we work collaboratively. Formally assigned or informally. It’s not a “personality type”.

Virtually everyone is follower at some point of time in professional & personal life. Even person in authority is plays a role of follower many times. Followers and leaders both orbit around the purpose, followers do not orbit around the leader. Follower is not a term of weakness but the condition that permits leadership to exist and gives it strength. Follower is also not synonymous with subordinate. A subordinate reports to an individual of higher rank and may in practice be a supporter, an antagonist, or indifferent. However a follower shares a common purpose with the leader, believes in what the organization is trying to accomplish, wants both the leader and organization to succeed, and works energetically to this end.

Value of the follower:

·         Leaders cannot exist without followers!

·         In today’s world, “followers” lead “leaders” – due to Inward pyramid of knowledge.

·         No one becomes “leader” without being a “follower”.

·         Leaders strategize but followers get the things done.

Followers Expectations of Leaders:

Followers actively evaluate their leaders and in many cases find their performance below par. Often it is the limitations imposed by a leader that stops the follower from performing at their best. From the follower’s viewpoint effective leaders embrace them as partners and are influenced by their words and actions.

What is an effective follower?

The “Effective followers” chose to follow a good leader and accept all the consequences of that decision including the limits to their actions imposed by the leader. In exchange effective followers want their leaders to share information, involve them in decision making and create working environments in which the efforts of followers are recognised, respected and rewarded.

Strategies for Promoting “Effective Following” at a workplace:

Leaders can foster a culture of effective following by adopting the following strategies:

-          Adopt a management style based on the philosophy that - successful leadership is dependent on actions of the leader, followers and the quality of their interaction.

-          Communicate this philosophy of leadership throughout the team.

-          Conduct training programs for all employees (including senior management) to inform them of the concept and practice of “effective following”.

-          Conduct training programs for managers, supervisors and team leaders to educate them on how to encourage and manage “effective followers”.

-          Build “effective following” into performance reviews for all employees.

-          Reward and celebrate outstanding examples of effective following and follower oriented leadership.

“He who cannot be a good follower cannot be a good leader”- Aristotle

Happy Following!

 *** This article is published in Apr 2015 issue of the in-house leadership magazine"perspective", at my current organization.