Recently, my family and I completed an Escape Room event. We were required to escape from a candy store. With very little items in the room all 8 of us erupted into chaos trying to dig up a clue. My uncle ended up taking charge and giving out instructions for each of us to follow. We almost completed the Escape Room in record time but because of the initial panic we fell just short. How did my uncle become a leader in this situation? He was not given this role. He does not possess noticeable qualities or traits. Why did all 7 of us follow his direction without complaint? I believe he possessed an emergent leadership and personal power to established direction and support in followers.
It is interesting how, a leader has power when they are able to affect follower’s beliefs, attitudes, and courses of action (Northouse, 2021, p. 10). This leadership can either be gifted by a manager or boss, or it can appear without influence of a position. My uncle was not given a position of leadership, no one assigned him this role. He simply began giving out directions and everyone followed. When someone’s leadership surfaces in a situation, this is called emergent leadership. This type of behavior is pretty common with my uncle. If he took a five-factor personality model test believe he would have scored high in openness and extraversion. According to Northouse (2021), openness aligns with being informed, creative, insightful and curious; while extraversion aligns more with being sociable, assertive, and positive (Northouse, 2021, p. 35). These are two personalities that align strongly with leadership, so it does not surprise me if he matched these descriptions. In this situation I believe power plays a role is leadership as well. French and Raven (1965) were able to identify six bases of power, those include: referent, expert, legitimate, reward, coercive, and information (Northouse, 2021, p.11). My uncle had been to over 10 escape rooms across the country. I would almost say he was an expert. Based on French and Raven’s 6 bases of power, I believe my uncle had an expert power. Expert power occurs when a leader is knowledgeable in their subject. Why did that expert power, encourage us all to follow his lead?
According to Northouse (2021), “followership is about how individuals accept the influence of others to reach a common goal (Northouse, 2021, p. 373). In this case our goal was to escape the room. For many of us any plan was a good plan as opposed to chaos. I believe most of us followers were, exemplary followers. An exemplary follower is someone who both thinks independently and is actively engaging (Northouse, 2021, p. 390). Since this was an escape room, we were all completed our individual tasks. One person took on the locks, another person looked for clues we may have missed, while another was trying to comprehend the number sequence. We all actively engaged in our surroundings in compliance with the groups mission, but we were independent in our processes.
One reason why I believe we were all so productive was because of our need to be a part of a group. Psychologist William Schutz (1958) argued that one of humans’ strongest interpersonal needs is to know whether they belong to the group (Northouse, 2021, p. 371). In this situation no one wanted to be the person who was not contributing to the activity, we all wanted to find a clue. With so limited number of clues and puzzles we all worked as hard as possible to find even the smallest of things. I remember finding a few clues and feeling a sense of accomplishment, excitement, and recognition.
In conclusion, after an exciting game of escape room I came to realize the factors that made my group one of the fastest times. As a leader my uncle possessed many leadership qualities including emergent leadership, expert power, and high levels of openness and extraversion. The rest of the group (the followers) maintained exemplary followership and strived to contribute to the group.
References:
Northouse, P. G. (2021). Leadership: Theory and Practice (9th Edition). SAGE Publications, Inc. (US). https://bookshelf.vitalsource.com/books/9781071834473
I have herd that escape rooms can be a fun and challenging experience for friends and family. How interesting and insightful that you notice even is “recreation” an example of leadership. Your uncle certainly seems to possess an extraordinary amount of natural leadership qualities as well as a substantial amount of personal power amongst you and your family.
Currently serving in the US Coast Guard, I remember one of my first Commanding Officers explaining to a few of us, that a leader is only as successful as their subordinates (followers) allow them to be. That the degree to which a follower recognizes their authority and essentially agrees to be lead is tantamount to the level of success they will experience in their position.
The image that stands out from your post is not just how successful leader you uncles was, but the degree to which the rest of your family were excellent followers. Northouse (2021) explains Chaleff’s concept of the the type of courage he believed followers needed to posses, including the courage to “assume the responsibility for the common purpose” (p. 632) even if it’s just a family game, and/or “support the leader…” (p. 632) by quickly recognizing the emergent role they have assumed and readily taking instructions from him. I doubt you would have been so successful as a team had the rest of your family not decided to be good followers for your uncle’s leadership.
References:
Northouse, P. G. (2021). Leadership: Theory & Practice (9 ed.). Thousand Oaks, California: Sage Publications, Inc.
Hi! I think this is such an interesting topic. Escape rooms are an activity that my family enjoys and I have completed many different escape rooms. I had the same experience as you did. One of my family members took the role of becoming the leader and the rest of us followed their instruction. We all had a common goal: to escape the room as fast as possible. Having one leader made it less chaotic and we used more teamwork instead of each of us trying on our own. I liked how you connected the leadership role with the Big Five Test. I agree and think that the leader in my family exhibits the same qualities that you said your uncle has. Overall, this was a great way to use information that we learned in class and apply it to your own life. Great job on this post!