Snapshot Paper #3

Calvin Cortez
11/3/2013

Leader is to Follower as Flower is to Bee
A leaders main function is to set a vision and path for followers to take in
order to accomplish a goal. As a leader, it is ones duty to actively influence and
interact with followers to steer them in the right direction. Followers, in turn, are
charged with completing all the tasks involved with completing a goal. They must be
willing to put forth an effort for a cause. They should also practice responsibility by
being conscious of the direction that they are being led. These two entities make up
the leadership process as reflexive roles that can be stepped into at any point.
Because the relationship between leader and follower is so close and
interdependent, I chose to relate their relationship to the relationship between a
flower and a bee
The flower and the bee have a mutualistic relationship in nature. They both
rely on each other for their well-being. The bee relies on the flower for its
sustenance and in turn spreads the flowers pollen so that it may reproduce. Neither
party in this relationship would be able to survive without the other. I believe that
the leader/ follower relationship works in much the same way; both groups are
equally important to each other.
Although leaders are often the more glorified and discussed party, they are
not any more important than followers. A leader cannot carry out a vision without a
strong follower base that provides manpower to carry out a vision or a goal. Leaders
put a great burden on their followers to take the bulk of the work and live up to
expectations. Sometimes, leaders can forget the importance of their followers and
this often leads to disastrous results. I quickly learned this as a volunteer on the IMA
medical mission trip to Nicaragua. Our team leader was beginning to get frustrated
with how we were filling out patient paperwork and decided to take matters into
her own hands. She ordered us all to drop what we were doing and let her
interview, evaluate, and process each patient on her own. Within 10 minutes of
making her drastic change, it became apparent that she was hurting the mission. We
just sat and watched as our whole operation began to crumble. Our team leader
simply did not have the capacity to do the job of 10 people. While she was more
experienced and qualified than any of us, she had no choice but to depend on us to
carry out the job. Before too long, we reconciled and went back to working. But just
like she depended on us, we depended heavily on her. We not medical professionals
by any means and were lost without her guidance; this was part of the reason for
her frustration in the first part. From this experience I learned that in order to
achieve goals, there must be a high reciprocity between leaders and followers.
However, some would argue that leaders and followers are not equals in the
leadership process
Jean Miller, professor of psychiatry at Boston University, does not hold my
same viewpoint when it comes to the relationship between leaders and followers.
She lays out the leader/follower relationship as a dominant/ subordinate(Miller,
1978) one. She argues that there is inequality in any relationship and it can usually
be attributed to differences in status and power between two parties. She concludes
that mutually enhancing interaction is not probably between unequals(Miller
1978). However, the problem with this model is that many of the examples are
drawn from historical situations where there is a clear and devious dominant group.
She uses slavery and the suppression of women as examples but they are no longer
relevant to modern day life. The leader/follower relationship occurs in a different
context than the one she describes; leaders and followers are both headed towards
the same goal. When that goal is reached, the interactions between the two parties
are by definition mutually enhancing. Her dominant/subordinate labels are
oversimplified and apply an overly animalistic explanation to how humans interact.
Scottish historian Thomas Carlyle explored how leaders come to be in his
essay The Hero as King. Carlyle states that a leader is practically the summary for
us all the various figures of heroism, priest, teacher,embodies itself here, to
command over us.(Carlyle, 1902) He also argues that a leader should be the ablest
man(Carlyle, 1902) should take control and lead his people through example.
Tolstoy, by making leaders the focal point of the process, makes the mistake of
disregarding followers. He presents them as somewhat mindless and does not
mention their role and relationship with leaders. His ablest man is a generalization
of a perfect man which we know does not exist. He also fails to specify how the
leader should lead; he just focuses on being a good man and does not dig into
application of leadership skills.
James Macgregor Burns on the other hand does not boil leadership down to a
dominant or heroic relationship. Rather, he coins the terms transactional and
transforming leadership(Burns, 1978) to explain how leaders and followers
interact. Transactional leadership happens when two individuals make contact in
order to benefit from each other and transformational leadership happens when
two parties engage as a way to improve each other and themselves. In contrast to
the authors above, Burns thinks that power bases are linked not as counterweights
but as mutual support for common purpose.(Burns, 1978) This viewpoint support
my metaphor of bee and flower because it highlights both leader and follower
benefit from the relationship and differentiates between naked power
wielding(Burns, 1978) and the actual reciprocal relationship that occurs between
leaders and followers.
Professor Robert E. Kelley of Carnagie Mellon University would also argue
that effective followers are essential for any goal to be achieved. Bosses are not
necessarily good leaders, subordinates are not necessarily effective
followers,(Kelley 1988) he writes as a direct contrast to the traditional
domination/subordination model. He then redefines followership and leadership by
encouraging us to re-think our current understanding of leadership. Instead of
seeing the leadership role as superior to and more active than the role of follower,
we can think of them as equal but different activities.(Kelley 1988) Kelleys
argument supports the bee/flower analogy by presenting leadership as an
interdependent relationship.
Leader is to follower as flower is to bee because one cannot exist without the
other. The stereotypical leader/ follower relationship is oversimplified to the point
where it is no longer realistic. We are never held to a single position; we can both
lead and follow. In a healthy leadership model both parties rely on each other for
support and feedback on their way to success.
References:

Kelley, R. (1988). In praise of followers. In J. Wren (Ed.),The Leader's
Companion (pp. 193-206). New York: The Free Press.Carlyle, T. (1902). The hero as
king. In J. Wren (Ed.), The Leader's Companion (pp.53-54). New York: The Free Press.
Miller, J. (1976). Domination/subordination. In J. Wren (Ed.),The Leader's
Companion (pp. 222-230). New York: The Free Press.
Burns, J. (1978). Transactional and transforming leadership. In J. Wren
(Ed.), The Leader's Companion (pp. 100-101). New York: The Free Press.
Kelley, R. (1988). In praise of followers. In J. Wren (Ed.),The Leader's
Companion (pp. 193-206). New York: The Free Press.