OBSERVE, INTERNALISE AND IMPROVISE : MY 3 STEP FOLLOWERSHIP GUIDE TO GREAT LEADERSHIP

While we come across reams of research and perspectives on ‘Leadership’ in the context of business organizations, there appears to be a serious dearth of literature on “followership”.

I would define “Followership” as the keen art of observing, internalizing and improvising the behaviors ?of great leaders.

Followers are the members of the organization who add value to the practice of leadership . Without efficient followers, there could never be leaders. We all crave to be leaders, but none wants to be a follower. Little do we realize that followership is the stepping stone to become great leaders one day.

Followers are different from hangers on or sycophants of which there is no dearth in organizations. Please do refer to my earlier article on this platform itself, “When did your organization conduct the last organizational leech survey".

When I entered the organization ecosystem 25 years ago, I was a timid out of college nerd who never had any ?pretensions of influencing others leave alone ??mastering the art of great leadership.

However, around me, in my superiors and influencers, I found 3 types of people- one good, the other great and the third, who did often fail. I did not have to learn the journey of good to great. Quietly, not out of design, but mere inquisitiveness I was drawn to observe the behaviours of the great leaders. ?What they did when confronted with a problem, their approach towards solving it and the methods of ensuring that the solutions were implemented. It was a fabulous leadership lab. The quiet observance was accompanied by an unconscious internalization – the second step to attaining leadership effectiveness. This perhaps continued subtly within the confines of my subconscious mind, even as I went about dutifully performing routine tasks and learning new skills over several years. Little did I realize, that deep within, the fascination of observing exemplary role models around me was engendering a fierce desire to o internalize their behaviours. Looking back, I would say it was akin to a silent metamorphosis within me from a shrinking violet to a striking sunflower.

The moth to butterfly moment came when my organization callously pitchforked me to a leadership role after some years. How, when confronted by situation after situation to rise to the occasion , I would , everytime, enter into a trance like reflection to the internalized leadership behaviours within me and come up with solutions improvised from these internalized behaviors.

What was remarkable was that this improvisation had many shades- at times, it was spontaneous at other times, it was deeply calculative but on all occasions, it was effective.

Whether it was an act of courage, empathy, visioning, guiding, inspiring, motivating, coercing, influencing, harmonizing, humility, dominance and so on– the behaviours were displayed with amazing precision and desired impact. ?

Moral of the story -? Leadership is best learnt by observing great leaders, internalizing their behaviours and improvising the learnings to achieve leadership success.