{"id":303770,"date":"2018-04-03T13:08:45","date_gmt":"2018-04-03T20:08:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.swimmingworldmagazine.com\/news\/?p=303770"},"modified":"2018-04-03T13:16:26","modified_gmt":"2018-04-03T20:16:26","slug":"the-greatest-myth-of-leadership-followers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.swimmingworldmagazine.com\/news\/the-greatest-myth-of-leadership-followers\/","title":{"rendered":"The Greatest Myth of Leadership\u2014Followers"},"content":{"rendered":"

There are no passive roles in successful group dynamics. Everyone needs to lead.- Leadership Lanes by Toni Armstrong<\/em> (A Multi-Part Series Presented by Swimming World)<\/p>\n

\u201cA leader without followers<\/em><\/span>
\n is simply a man taking a walk.\u201d<\/em><\/span>
\n –John Boehner<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

The leader-follower dynamic is symbiotic in nature where one cannot exist without the other.\u00a0 It is as common a pairing as peanut butter and jelly, Romeo and Juliet, Thelma and Louise, Red Wine and Chocolate, and Bert and Ernie.\u00a0 The core of this concept is true\u2014you cannot lead without a group\u2014but pairing a leader with a follower is highly problematic in positive leadership practices.\u00a0 This is because a follower is as mythical a creature as a Greek Siren, and equally as dangerous for your program.<\/p>\n

Have you ever asked a room full of people to raise their hands if they want to be a follower?\u00a0 It doesn\u2019t matter if this is a classroom of high schoolers, a room of coaches at a coaching conference, or professionals in a board room meeting.\u00a0 The answer will be the same: stillness.\u00a0 After a few awkward moments, people will slowly and uncomfortable begin raising their hands, as if volunteering tribute to the cause.\u00a0 You see, everyone recognizes the value of followers, but no one wants to take the role. \u00a0Why is this?<\/p>\n

Well, to start, our culture places a huge emphasis on becoming a leader and not a follower.\u00a0 It is the core of most job applications, the main focus of college admissions departments and college curricula, and continues to trickle down from there.\u00a0 In this leader-follower dynamic, a follower is a negative term, a void; someone without a backbone who adopts the beliefs and opinions of others.\u00a0 A follower is a someone who can be manipulated because they have no thoughts, ideas, or opinions of their own.\u00a0 A follower is someone who contributes very little to society, a worker bee, an uninspired and unmotivated individual.<\/p>\n

Luckily for us, this passive follower is a mythical creature.\u00a0 No one raises their hand or wants to be this person, because no one is this person in real life. Leading with the assumption that this passive follower exists will steer your ship into the rocks.\u00a0 People want to be involved, to feel valued, and to contribute.\u00a0 People want to be leaders, and a successful dynamic is much more complex than the binary implies.<\/p>\n

Modern leadership dynamics have tried to redefine how we view followership.\u00a0 One theory has even defined the hierarchical reasons why people follow to further the ethics and functionality of followership:<\/p>\n