Leading and Following: A Symbiotic Relationship
Dr. David Rafeedie
Jack led what appeared to be a successful organization for many years. Everything on the outside looked good. Income was stable, and in comparison to like organizations of similar size, the profit seemed healthy. But if one were to do an assessment there would be some red flags. What seemed stable was actual stagnancy. An organization does stay stagnant for long. At some point, they will begin to go downhill, or they will recognize their situation and make some moves to change the trajectory upward.
While income was stable and profits seemed healthy, employee turnover was high. At every level of the organization, people did not stay long. In fact, the culture of the organization was negative. Employees complained often. They showed up for work, collected their paycheck, and gave no thought to the mission of the organization. They did not look beyond their specific agenda. The executive team felt controlled in their role and ignored as people. They worked hard, but their efforts were not aligned and they too operated by their agendas. The leadership and organizational culture were fractured and at times toxic, as complaints and grumbling were common.
Jack was in it for himself. He was happy with where things were, and he used his team, including the executive team as his assistants to ensure the boat did not get rocked. He said all the right things. Ask him, and he would tell you what a great team he had. He echoed words of concern when needed but didn’t spend much time thinking about them as human beings with needs, concerns, and just as important, smart people with good ideas. The organization functioned at his capacity. It was stagnant and was about to begin trending down. All organizations grow or shrink, to the capacity of its leadership. Jack controlled the show and micromanaged the stage.
I love this quote from Simon Sinek, in his book, “Leaders Eat Last: Why Some Teams Pull Together and Others Don’t.”
In physics, the definition of power is the transfer of energy. We measure the power of a lightbulb in watts. The higher the wattage, the more electricity is transferred into light and heat and the more powerful the bulb. Organizations and their leaders operate exactly the same way. The more energy is transferred from the top of the organization to those who are actually doing the job, those who know more about what’s going on on a daily basis, the more powerful the organization and the more powerful the leader.
Of course, there is a difference between having a position of leadership and being a leader. You may be the formal leader of an organization or a team, but there may be “informal” leadership that moves the team in a direction you do not want it to go.
Every organization needs healthy and strong leaders and healthy and strong followers. People who set direction and initiate vision and people who follow direction and put feet on the road to achieving the vision. A healthy relationship between leader and follower, leader and team members, is critical to the success of the team and the organization. The leader and the team members need each other and cannot be successful without the other. That may seem obvious, but it is so often forgotten. Disrespect for leadership in organizations is quite common. Disregard for team members is not unusual. Viewing them as a tool to accomplish the leader’s goals rather than as people who are significant and necessary for the good of the organization is all too common an attitude.
There is a great deal of literature on leadership. Leadership books and articles are as numerous as the sand grains on a beach. Rightly so—good leadership is critical to the success of every team and every organization. But there is not much written on healthy, strong followers. That is unfortunate because the relationship between leading and following are flip sides of the same coin. Both leadership and followership are significant. To quote an old Sinatra song about love and marriage, “You can’t have one without the other.” I believe trumpeting followership is as important as holding up leadership as something to be attained. Not everyone, either by personality or talent is a leader. That is a good thing because if everyone were trying to lead the organization or team would be paralyzed.
The relationship between the two must be understood, so the right intentional work to enhance the relationship is designed and implemented. Strong, healthy leadership looks like something, and strong, healthy followership has specific characteristics too. Those characteristics are intrinsically tied together. The closeness and health of both are critical for an organization to have a positive culture and for effectiveness.
Good leaders create good followers. Healthy leadership facilitates healthy teams and organizations. Here are some healthy characteristics of a healthy team leader:
Good leaders recognize their team is the most important group of people in her organization. Take care of your team, and they will take care of business.
Good leaders empower their teams to accomplish the mission and achieve the vision. They are open to hear constructive criticism and receive and implement good ideas that enhance the team and organization.
Good leaders give their team members permission to make mistakes, learn from those mistakes, and make progress.
Good leaders deal with conflict on their team promptly and deal with it well. Not dealing with conflict or not dealing with it promptly can lead to a toxic team and even organizational culture.
Good leaders serve their teams by equipping them to do the job.
Good leaders are focused on results.
Good leaders recognize a job well done, verbally and substantially. And if a team member goes over and above then a special recognition should be made. In our organization, we have an “Above and Beyond” trophy that a team member can place on their desk for a month or until someone else wins the award. It is a Buzz Lightyear action figure on a nice stand. We have fun with it and recognize someone making the extra effort. We try to award this monthly, but it must be a legitimate and impactful above and beyond effort.
Good leaders give away credit to the team as a whole and the individual team members.
Being a follower is a legitimate place to be. Follower is not a dirty word. Every organization and every team need followers. Being in a role that is not a leadership role is just as crucial to an organization as being the leader. No follower—no leader! Here are some healthy characteristics of followers:
Good team members exhibit a positive attitude.
Good team members champion the direction of the organization or team.
Good team members are supportive and encouraging to other team members.
Good team members have excellent attendance.
Good team members are willing to sacrifice their initiatives for the sake of the team. They suborn their agenda for the agenda of the team.
Good team members are focused on results.
Good team members have a healthy peer accountability.
Good team members and the team try to make the leader look good.
An important truism that has been around a long time, “to be a good leader you first have to learn to follow.” The reason is that if you are a good follower, it gives a perspective on the people you lead that you would not otherwise have. That perspective of following well will give you insights on how to motivate and inspire the team and organization you lead. The insights gained from being a good follower allows the leader to lead by example in a meaningful way. How a leader allows these insights to inform his or her leadership helps form the culture of the team and the organization. The culture is initiated and shaped by the leader.
In a culture where the relationship between leader and follower is properly understood and valued, the expectations for focus, excellence, and results increase. That is true because people are valued and equipped. There is collaboration. New ideas, whether from the leader or a team member receive respect and consideration. The leader values his team, and the individual team members value the leader, each other, and the team. Together, leader and team members work at achieving the mission. Together, they ensure the healthy culture remains in place and confront any elements of toxicity before they become embedded in the culture. The organizational and team culture that values its leaders and followers will have a higher retention rate for employees and will find that potential employees will be attracted to the organization.
Edgar H. Schein, in his excellent book, “The corporate Culture Survival Guide” says this:
Culture matters because it is a powerful, latent, and often unconscious set of forces that determine both our individual and collective behavior, ways of perceiving, thought patterns, and values. Organizational culture matters because cultural elements determine strategy, goals, and modes of operating.
Also, check out this article in the Harvard Business Review that relates to this topic. It is a bit dated and a little lengthy but the research is good and it is worth the read. There are some gems to glean. https://hbr.org/2007/03/what-it-means-to-work-here.
Working together with the right coach can help you lead your organization and lead your team more effectively. A healthy team and organizational culture lead to greater effectiveness. I can leverage my experience in business and in non-profits to help you in your leadership as you lead your team and organization. The right assessment to help you determine your current position and designing the right next steps are ways a coach can help. That, in turn, will lead to more profitability in areas where that is important, and better service and delivery systems.
This article was first published on my website blog. If you are reading this on social media, check out my website www.davidthecoach.com for more information on leadership, teams, and other success factors. Click on the “contact me” button on my website l.;,/and let’s have a conversation.