While surfing the web on leadership topics, I came across a really interesting video called, “Leadership Lessons from The Dancing Guy”. Derek Sivers created a three-minute talk based on the video, giving it the term “first follower” and stating: “The best way to make a movement, if you really care, is to courageously follow and show others how to follow” (Sivers, 2010). A follower showing others how to follow is emergent leadership. This example shows of how effective emergent leadership can be if one is willing to be the first to step up and follow the leader.
As the video shows a man is dancing alone but surrounded by a crowd of people. After some time a second man joins the dancing man. The first man is the leader and the second man is the follower. This follower makes others feel comfortable and they begin to support and accept the follower’s behavior (Northouse, 2013) by joining with him and dancing turning making an emergent leader out of this follower .
This idea can be translated to the work place. Many times a leader has to make unpopular decisions. Maybe it’s requiring everyone to work overtime or come in early. Whatever the case, sometimes all it takes is just one follower to become an emergent leader and support the leader, bringing along other followers who will decide that the situation is not as bad as it seems.
This approach to emergent leadership is different than I had pictured it when reading about emergent leadership in the introduction of our text and provides me with the opportunity to be an emergent leader if only in a single incidence.
Northouse, P.G. (2013). Leadership: Theory and Practice. Los Angeles: Sage Publications.
Sivers, D. (2010). Leadership lessons learned from the dancing guy. Retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fW8amMCVAJQ&noredirect=1
sif5164 says
I remember seeing this video as part of a TED Talk presentation by Derek Sivers. Funny how this is sort of a microcosm of leadership/followership. Mr. Sivers talked about how you could use this as a sort of road map on how to start a trend. Take something that isn’t necessarily popular, make it look fun and interesting; recruit people to your cause, and nurture the recruits; soon enough, they are recruiting their own followers and you have a united front where the ones who aren’t participating look like the outsiders.
References
Sivers, D. How to Start a Movement . Retrieved from http://www.ted.com/talks/derek_sivers_how_to_start_a_movement?language=en.