In consideration of the infinitely interesting topic of leadership there are a multitude of definitions, in fact according to Northhouse (2016), there have been over 200 definitions over the last century and over 65 different classification systems of leadership within the past 60 years. Clearly, the topic of leadership has our attention and it is no surprise. According to Hedges (2014), over 14 billion dollars are spent each year by American companies on leadership development training and the reason for this is simple, good leadership is important. However, with all of this focus on producing good leaders and what defines a leader, have we missed the other half of leadership, the follower? If a doctor graduated medical school and had only studied the head and not the body, would you entrust them as your family physician? We know that separated from the body, a head cannot survive, thousands of years of historical executions attest to that. With this in mind, it is incredible how so little attention is placed on the other half of leadership, the follower. It is important that we understand the importance of the follower within the leader-follower dynamic in order to truly understand leadership.
In order for there to be a leader and leadership, there must be followers and followership. Long gone are the days of the early 20th century where leadership was viewed as having control and centralization of power, with the central theme being domination, (Northouse, 2017, pg. 2). As time has progressed so to has leadership and that change has focused in many ways on the follower. The idea of influence began to emerge along with the relationship between the leader and the group/ followers during the 1930’s and has continued to today (Northouse, 2017, p.3-5). Members of a group must be considered for effective leadership, as leadership is an “interactive event” (Northouse, 2016, p. 6). Nearly every concept about leadership, when considered, directly involves the follower, how they perceive leaders and how leaders are able to influence that perception and motivate followers to achieve common goals.
There are four components central to leadership; leadership is a process, it involves influence, it occurs within a group context, and it involves goal attainment (PSU WC, L.1, 2017). Within each of these central components, the follower is at least half of the equation if not more. Understanding leadership as process, means it is a transactional event where the leader affects and is affected by the followers of the group (Northouse, 2016). There is a two-way interaction that occurs in leadership, without the follower, the interaction would be a one-way street. Leadership as it involves influence is again significantly intertwined with the follower and is so critical that Northouse (2016), put it simply, “without influence leadership does not exist” (p. 6). Leadership can only occur in groups; without people or the “group/followers” to influence and achieve a common goal, leadership would not exist (Northouse, 2016). Furthermore, considering the definition of leadership, there must be a common goal that is to be achieved, however without followers there is no group to have a common goal with.
A great deal of research has been conducted on the traits of leaders, what separates leaders from followers and how those traits influence the interaction between leaders and followers. (Northouse, 2016). With this in mind, it is important to consider why over 50 of the top traits listed in research from Stogdill, 1948 & 1974, Mann 1959, Lord DeVader, and Alliger 1986, Kirkpatrick and Locke 1991, and Zaccaro, Kemp, and Bader 2004 (as cited in Northouse, 2016) are given. What caused the various “top” traits to emerge such as self-confidence, sociability, intelligence, extraversion, motivation, conscientiousness, and emotional intelligence? I suggest the reason is that it is the reaction of followers to leaders who posses certain traits that result in successful leadership, which propelled these various “top” traits to the forefront of research on the trait approach. Considering the definition of leadership to influence a group of individuals to achieve a common goal (Northouse 2016), we must understand that there is a connection between successful leadership traits and successful leadership, recognizing that positive correlation is a result of the reaction of followers, in part, to their leader’s traits.
Overall, the idea that leadership is not solely a result of a leader but also the followers is nothing new. What is interesting however is the abundance of information on leadership that focuses so greatly on leaders but seems to put followers in the background. Simply Google leadership and you will get about 355M results; Google followership and you will get approximately 764K results. We have seen how history has developed the concept and even definition of leadership from one of domination to one of harmony and it is evident that followership and those who are being led are important, however we still have a long way to go. Understanding that leadership and followership are two sides of the same equation is key and that without one you cannot have the other. Without the body a head cannot survive and so to, without followers, leadership cannot survive.
Resources:
Hedges, K. (2014, Sep 23). If you think leadership development is a waste of time you may be right. Forbes. Retrieved from https://www.forbes.com/sites/work-in-progress/2014/09/23/if-you-think-leadership-development-is-a-waste-of-time-you-may-be-right/#7aa7b5165bf4
Northouse, P. G. (2016). Leadership: Theory and Practice (7th ed.). Los Angeles, CA: SAGE Publications Ltd.
The Pennsylvania State University World Campus. (2017). Lesson 1: Introduction to Leadership. Retrieved from https://psu.instructure.com/courses/1867456/modules/items/22975618
I too found that at least until this point in this course the role of the followers outside acknowledging they exist is very limited as is their viewpoint toward leadership. Our text discusses the trait approach works best if leadership profiles exist and that self-assessment of one’s traits could be used for personal awareness and development (Northouse, 2016, p. 29). Would you not agree that a valued assessment of leadership might come from the input of the followers? I understand that there will be some erroneous input from followers, but discounting the extremely high and low ratings, I would assume the result would provide an organization with an even better determination of one’s leadership skills assuming a profile is in place for comparison.
I started working in the 1980’s and can attest that control and power remained as the dominant leadership tactic even though this decade, according to our text, was the time that there was an explosion of scholarly articles on leadership (Northouse, 2016, p. 4). Apparently I worked at a facility that was behind the times and do not feel that leadership changed until closer to the mid 1990’s. This transition coincided with my company’s sale to a larger corporation when performance plans and 360 degree assessments were introduced. It was not until this year (believe it or not) that our facility held a leadership seminar involving all of our site leaders. Unfortunately, this was a result of the fall-out from our town hall meeting when our corporate leaders realized that our entire facility, outside the site leaders, were in the dark in regards to the vision, changes and future of the organization. Before this seminar the only transparency that exited at my facility was the use of the word “transparency”.
Works Cited
Northouse, P. G. (2016). Leadership : Theory and Practice (7th ed.). Thousand Oaks, California: SAGE.