Good article about "followship"

[flexagon]

If you can have leadership, you should be able to have "followship" -- the art of following a leader.

Normally... we concentrate on leadership -- being in charge, being out in front, being a trendsetter, blazing a trail.

But today, at least, we're going to take a look at the other side of the equation -- what it means to be a good follower.

http://www.salesstar.com/mm092704.htm


I think that almost everyone on my friendslist (HLM aside) is working for other people right now, so this article should be relevant to most of us. I think it's not perfect, but it's a step in the right direction. Most of us are followers at our workplaces, even if we are leaders too. Now that I've discovered this concept I find it kind of interesting that I've never heard of it before, or even heard thoughts along these lines.

Comments

[hiddenbear.livejournal.com]

All good points that seem obvious after reading them, but I wouldn't have thought about them before.

I think I'm good at micro-followship, but bad at macro-followship. I couldn't care less about my company's vision, and wouldn't follow upper management if they were tragging $500 bills behind them. But within my group, I'm both a good leader and follower.

[flexagon]

That's pretty much exactly how I feel. Larry Ellison? Fuck him and his stupid short-sighted vision, and fuck his yacht too. Steve, my immediate supervisor? Yeah, there's a lot I could learn there and I'm trying to learn how he thinks. Dan the Cat? I'd follow him into the heart of the sun, after an appropriate amount of measured debate.

It's a shame, because when we were Politic Frog we had a nice CEO who I really did like, and I never had the chance to really know what his vision was.