Why Followership is the New Leadership

Via Social Media

The term “followers” is one measurement of content value. @TechCrunch and @Mashable are leading sources of intelligence because they have earned millions of followers.

In Academia

Followership is the mastery of scholarly research and processes. Authors follow frameworks to draft new arguments and conclusions. Mathematicians, scientists, and doctors follow equations to carry out critical procedures.

The most accomplished college, advanced degree, and PhD graduates excel because they have proven themselves as the very best scholarly followers. The best academic followers usually become the very best academic leaders.

The best academic followers usually become the very best academic leaders. @RedBaronUSA

Click To Tweet

In Athletics

Followership is the ability to be coached, trained, disciplined, and physically challenged under pressure. Players do not earn positions on world-class athletic rosters without proving to coaches they are excellent followers.

The films Invictus, Rudy, and Miracle (and my favorite, HBO Sports’ documentary of the 1980 USA Olympic Hockey Team) portray real-life examples of excruciating followership required for competitive leadership.

In Military Schools

Followership is taught deliberately. I am not referring to blood n’ guts Hollywood hyperbole, but rather how West Point (Annapolis, New London, Kings Point, Colorado Springs, Citadel, VMI) actively teaches phases of followership to cadets for four grueling years.

Surprisingly, the number-one college in America is no longer Harvard, Princeton, or Yale; West Point is now #1. What’s more empowering is that gender and race have zero bearing upon followership. West Point women and international minorities master their rigorous disciplines brilliantly, proving that equal opportunities for leadership do exist for everyone –– via the mutual hard work of followership.

Equal opportunities for leadership do exist for everyone –– via the mutual hard work of followership.

In Politics

Followership is proof of loyalty, durability, and experience. Roles in politics today are excruciating, and divisive. Political and religious leaders risk a great deal, including their lives. Akin to business, disloyal, flakey, and inexperienced staffers can ruin years of political capital overnight. This is why steadfast political followers often make the best political leaders.

In Life

Those who follow rules, guidelines, and laws ultimately succeed. Those who engage in uncivil behavior ultimately fail.

In the Workforce

Followership is essential to efficient operations and administration. There is zero time (or extra capital) for backstabbing, drama, or dishonest agendas. True teamwork and innovation require transparent, unbiased, on-point followership via every desk in the organization.

In Col. Larry Donnithorne’s classic, “[easyazon_link asin=”0385417039″ locale=”US” new_window=”default” nofollow=”default” tag=”achievstrate-20″ add_to_cart=”default” cloaking=”default” localization=”default” popups=”default”]The West Point Way of Leadership[/easyazon_link],” followership is expertly defined in three ways:

Followership is a form of self-mastery, control of one’s individual ego, and the discipline of listening deeply.
Followership opens oneself to being remade into something more, usually via extreme circumstances that involve intense mental or physical challenges amongst peers.
No matter what level of the highest leadership attained, there is always another higher authority, power, or office that requires additional followership.

True teamwork and innovation require transparent, unbiased, on-point followership via every desk in the organization.

Followership proves character. Followership samples one’s ability to sacrifice for a larger cause –– a family, church, school, department, committee, or company, etc. Followership also strips hubris, selfishness, and dishonesty away –– three reasons why corporate America has been rife with leadership troubles.

Conversely, inexperienced prima donnas, ladder climbers, and quitters can only charade their way into leadership positions –– instead of honestly investing 10,000 hours (Outliers, Gladwell) into legitimate followership, gutting it out, and mastery.

Nature eventually relieves wannabes of their duties, although at a considerable expense to others and the organization.

Followership also strips hubris, selfishness, and dishonesty away –– three reasons why corporate America has been rife with leadership troubles.

Life, work, and athletic competition are not always fair. Injustices abound. Poor calls stand. And the sharks are everywhere. Complainers still add zero value. Never mind any of these. The very best followers live up to their obligations anyway, press on anyway, and focus 100% on their leaders’ expectations anyway.

Is leadership dead? Of course not. Never. The very best leaders are busy, keenly on lookout for the very best followers.
Did you like today’s post? If so you’ll love our frequent newsletter! Sign up HERE and receive The Switch and Shift Change Playbook, by Shawn Murphy, as our thanks to you!

Baron Christopher Hanson

Baron Christopher Hanson is the principal and lead strategist at RedBaron Strategy / PR (www.redbaronusa.com) in Charleston, South Carolina, and Palm Beach, Florida. A former rugby player, Harvard graduate, and expert on turnaround management and revenue growth, Hanson has written for Harvard Business Review, SmartBrief, and SwampFox considerably. Baron can be reached for advisory roles or speaking gigs via engage@redbaronUSA.com or over Twitter @RedBaronUSA

Steve Tappin CEO

Yes and no. You don’t lead by following, you lead by building a trusted fellowship with around those you, getting them excited about the mission, and dreaming and growing together. If we always just stuck to the rules and followed them blindly, then there would be know disruptive innovation. However, there is something to said for being a ‘CEO apprentice’, and extracting the maximum learning from every life and leadership experience.

For more thoughts on this topic, check out my LinkedIn post ‘Lift Your Leadership With These 7 Top CEO Secrets’:

https://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20130731102008-13518874-top-ceos-reveal-the-7-leadership-secrets
Justin Byrne

Thank you for the post Baron. I appreciate the recognition for those who focus
on learning their craft and who seek guidance from the leaders around
them. Many write about how leaders blaze their own trail and are so
inspirational that others cannot help but follow them. There is also something
special in those who listen intently and observe those around them…….
and when they are ready, capitalize upon their learnings to lead
great teams.
Charles H. Green

Ehhh, I’m not persuaded. For the sake of an apparent clever turn of phrase (“followership is the new leadership”) you have to do considerable injustice to the everyday meanings of the word. I find that too much parlor trick and not enough substance.

What you’re describing is mastery, discipline, and willingness to learn. All of which are quite arguably necessary conditions for leadership. But they are hardly sufficient conditions. Following enables leading, but it sure doesn’t do the job on its own.

In fact, if all you every do is follow everyone else, you’ll never practice leading, be seen as leading, or earn acceptance as a leader. The Gladwell 10,000 hour rule, and most of the rest here, are about mastery, jacks for openers, table stakes. “Leaders,” in the conventional sense of the word we use every day, are those willing to take the lead – to do something new, to go out on a limb, to take a risk, etc.

There is another germ of truth in what you say, in addition to gaining mastery, and that is that by showing respect to our leaders and others, we in some level earn the right to be respected in turn ourselves. And that’s very important; also a necessary condition for a leader, I would say. But again, not a sufficient condition.

Leader, the way we all understand that word, is different from follower – by definition! Juxtaposing them in the title doesn’t rewrite the dictionary.