Maximizing followership: What leaders and followers should know

The true success of an organization is not achieved until the leader elicits enthusiastic cooperation and support from the followers in order to achieve the organizational set goals and objectives. Followers remain one of the most critical or important components of the leadership process. They are fundamental to every successful organization.

Traditionally, followers are subordinate employees with less authority, power, and influence than their superiors and who usually take instruction from their superiors but do not always fall in line. In recent times, their status in an organizational setup has changed to one of the important stakeholders with high power status that ensures the success of the organization.

Nowadays, it has become a common phenomenon to hear followers lament about how their welfare and issues of motivation have been relegated to the background despite their efforts in ensuring the success of the organization. It is worth noting that effective leaders appreciate and reward hard work and performance. They do not appreciate and reward laziness and mediocrity.

Therefore, every effective leader expects that followers will bring their experience, talents, knowledge, and skills to bear and contribute to improving organizational productivity. As the organization grows and expands, followers will then reap the fruit thereof.

Over the years, leadership has evolved over time. Modern-day leadership, requires a collaborative effort from both the follower and the leader in order to succeed. In the past, the success of an organization was viewed from the leader-centric lens and little attention was given to the followers who actually work from the base to ensure the success of the organization. Today, they are viewed as critical elements for the success of the organization.

Followership could be defined as the willingness of followers to cooperate and support the leader in working towards accomplishing the organization’s mission, demonstrating a high degree of teamwork, and building cohesion among the workforce. Effective followership is an essential building block for effective leadership.

The role of followership in achieving organizational success cannot be overemphasized. The ability of the leader to elicit the cooperation and support of followers create an effective followership that will eventually promote effective leadership within the organization. Followership, therefore, is important because it creates the foundation on which effective leadership thrives.

According to R.E. Kelley in his work “in praise of followers,” he outlined five types of followers as indicated below whose cooperation and support the leader must galvanize in order to ensure effective followership:

i. Alienated – they are those followers who are independent and critical thinkers but are passive. They do not use their strengths to help the team achieve its goals. They have something of value but choose not to offer it for the progress of the team. Their passive nature distances them from the leader and their team members.

They tend to be the most troublesome followers. When they do not agree with a decision or course of direction, often they will not offer their input but readily offer passive resistance. Their refusal to cooperate without any meaningful reason only magnifies the conflict.

ii. Conformist/ Yes People – these types of followers are active but they are dependent and do not think critically. Because they are conformists, they will agree with the leader without questioning and rarely challenge the status quo. Their major concern is to avoid conflict. As such, these types of followers pose a danger to the leader and themselves due to their unwillingness and inability to put forth challenging viewpoints, which could produce a better outcome.

iii. Pragmatic/ Survivor – these types of followers are like the chameleon. They are adaptable but not in a positive way. They change their opinions and behaviors as and when the situation arises. They move with the flow. To them, following the path of least resistance serve as protection and keeps them out of the line of fire. Survivors are most interested in playing it safe rather than taking a risk. Their greatest fear is the fear of making a mistake.

iv. Passive/ Sheep – they are passive and dependent. As such they may not think critically. They tend to do as they are told and rarely put forth an opposing opinion. They leave the thinking to their leader. These attributes serve neither the team nor their fellow teammates. Because they require constant supervision and prodding, this type of follower negatively affects team dynamics and performance. As a leader, addressing this behavior head-on in a positive way could turn things around. This may be the perfect time to give some performance feedback and support to develop their ability to make a valuable contribution to the team.

v. Exemplary/ Effective/ Dynamic followers – they are proactive, independent, and able to think critically and also respectful of the authority of the leader. Effective followers are life-long learners. They practice self-leadership, take responsibility, are committed, and seek feedback to continuously improve their performance. They are very valuable to the leader and the team. Because of their consistent and high-quality contributions, these types of followers have often trusted advisors to the leader. Of the five types of followers, this is the type every follower must strive to be.

It is important for the leader to have knowledge of the types and characteristics of the followers mentioned above and how their personalities affect the success of the organization. Gaining or having a better understanding of those you lead can help you to become more effective as a leader.

The leadership process is expected to deliver certain outcomes or improve the productivity of the organization. So, knowing your followers as a leader may be of great benefit to you and the ultimate success of the organization. It gives the leader a better understanding of the type of followers to deploy for a specific assignment.

Maximizing followership is not a one-day wonder. It requires hard work and consistency in your leadership approaches as a leader coupled with tact and diplomacy. Your ability as a leader to relate and deploy strategies to elicit the enthusiastic cooperation and support of your mix of followers can be a very daunting task. You do not apply a wholesale strategy to your mix of followers.

Each and every type of follower identified in your organization requires a different kind of approach in order to get the best out of that follower. For instance:

i. Exemplary/Effective/Dynamic followers – require little or no supervision, create the right working environment, provide the right tools and equipment.

ii. Alienated followers – requires a conversation to have a shared understanding of the leader’s action, and some additional supervision such as simple verbal updates or simple progress reports, leaders should take the pain to solicit their feedback and act upon it.

iii. Yes–people – give them a comparatively less complex task, request frequent updates, put in tighter control of measures on performance, and pair the yes–people with an effective follower if possible.

iv. Sheep followers – do not use them for complex tasks, provide detailed instructions, increase supervision, and pair them with an effective follower if possible.

v. Survivor followers – need encouragement and assurance that their mistakes will not be used against them, require feedback and act on them, and reward or praise them when they take prudent risks.

In order to ensure effectiveness at every level of the organization, individuals within the organization are expected to demonstrate good qualities of followership. The ability of followers to do that skillfully will create a stronger framework for followership development within the organization.

According to Ira Challef, the following five dimensions of courageous followership reveal the attitudes and behaviors of the follower toward achieving the organization’s mission:

a. The courage to support the leader – courageous followers are not afraid of the hard work required to serve a leader. They assume new or additional responsibilities to unburden the leader and serve the organization. They stay alert for areas in which their strengths complement the leader’s and assert themselves in these areas. Courageous followers stand up for their leaders and the tough decisions a leader must make if the organization is to achieve its purpose. They are as passionate as the leader in pursuing a common purpose.

b. The courage to assume responsibility for a common purpose – the followers who are courageous assume responsibility for themselves and the organization. They do not hold an authoritarian image of the leader or organization and they do not expect the leader or organization to provide for their security and growth, or to give them permission to act. Courageous followers discover or create opportunities to fulfill their potential and maximize their value to the organization. They initiate value-based actions to improve the organization’s external activities and internal processes. The “authority” to initiate comes from the courageous follower’s understanding and ownership of the common purpose, and from the needs of those the organization serves.

c. The courage to constructively challenge the leader’s behaviors – the courageous followers give voice to the discomfort they feel when the behaviors or policies of the leader or group conflict with their sense of what is right. They are willing to stand up, stand out, or risk rejection, and initiate conflict in order to examine the actions of the leader and group when appropriate. They are willing to deal with the emotions their challenge evokes in the leader and group. Courageous followers value organizational harmony and their relationship with the leader, but not at the expense of the common purpose and their integrity.

d. The courage to participate in any transformation needed – when behaviors that jeopardize the common purpose remain unchanged, courageous followers recognize the need for transformation. They champion the need for change and stay with the leader and group while they mutually struggle with the difficulty of real change. They examine their own need for transformation and become full participants in the change process as appropriate.

e. And the courage to take a moral stand when warranted to prevent ethical abuses – often, the courageous followers know when it is time to take a stand that is different than that of the leader. This is because they are answering to a higher set of values. Their stand may involve refusing to obey a direct order, appealing the order to the next level of authority, or tendering one’s resignation. These and other forms of moral action involve a personal risk. But service to the common purpose justifies and sometimes demands acting. If attempts to redress the morally objectionable situation fail, a follower faces a more difficult prospect of whether to become a whistleblower which may also pose a great risk to the follower and the organization.

It is worth noting that followers remain that critical or very important component of the leadership process and should be treated with the utmost respect. They have expectations, needs, and personal goals and so leaders should constantly thrive to assist them to achieve these aspirations. Equally, leaders are also that critical and very important component of the leadership process and should be given the utmost respect and the needed cooperation and support to navigate the organization to success.