Followership Role Orientation: Leadership and Follower Dynamics
This paper reflects on the author's results from the Followership Role Orientation Scale and examines what those results reveal about the relationship between followers and leaders in organizational settings. Drawing on Johnson's (2021) framework of organizational ethics and Carsten and Uhl-Bien's (2017) scale, the paper explores the value of proactive followership, the limits of follower responsibility, and the ethical dimensions of follower–leader dynamics. The author argues that while followers can offer meaningful contributions and moral guidance, they should not be expected to compensate for failures of leadership, and that organizational culture ultimately determines how much influence followers can realistically exercise.
- Followership Role Orientation Scale Results: Author's score and core beliefs about followership
- The Value of Proactive Followership: How followers offer unique organizational perspective
- Johnson's Framework: Followers as Ethical Agents: Johnson's idealistic model of follower ethical influence
- Limits of Follower Responsibility: When followers should seek better-fit organizations
- Conclusion: Followership cannot substitute for genuine leadership
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What makes this paper effective
- The paper grounds its argument in a concrete self-assessment instrument, giving the reflection a measurable starting point that adds credibility and specificity.
- It engages critically with a scholarly source (Johnson, 2021), acknowledging the source's strengths while articulating clear, reasoned disagreements — demonstrating intellectual independence.
- The paper uses practical, real-world examples (internship programs, green energy initiatives) to illustrate abstract concepts about follower influence, making the argument accessible and concrete.
Key academic technique demonstrated
The paper demonstrates critical engagement with course material rather than passive acceptance. The author integrates self-assessment data with scholarly literature, then challenges a theoretical claim as "overly idealistic" by situating it within realistic organizational constraints. This technique — affirm, apply, critique — is a strong model for reflective academic writing at the graduate level.
Structure breakdown
The paper opens with the author's self-assessment score and personal beliefs about followership. It then introduces Johnson's (2021) framework as a counterpoint and area of expansion. The middle section weighs the merits and limits of Johnson's idealism against actual organizational realities. The paper closes with a clear normative claim: followership cannot substitute for genuine leadership, and organizational intervention — not follower heroism — is the proper remedy for leadership failure.
Followership Role Orientation Scale Results
On the Followership Role Orientation Scale created by Carsten and Uhl-Bien (2017), I scored a 27, indicating my belief in the need for strong, proactive approaches on the part of followers. I feel particularly strongly that followers should seek to offer their superiors suggestions that leadership might find valuable. Followers must seek to identify organizational problems as well as carry out the solutions suggested by others. A follower's vantage point can be very valuable, as leaders may not see everything going on within the organization.
I scored slightly less high in my conviction about the need to change superiors' minds. As a follower, I acknowledge that I may lack some of the information and big-picture knowledge a superior might have. Additionally, even superiors may have their hands tied by legal or policy decisions over which they have no control, so I try to channel my energies into changing what I can change rather than what I cannot.
The Value of Proactive Followership
Johnson (2021) offers an analysis of the followership role that might potentially shift my perspective on followership. Johnson (2021) stresses the need for followers to model high ideals, noting that superiors may themselves look to followers for moral direction. Through eliciting certain moral behaviors and ideals, followers can help set the agenda for the organization alongside its leaders. Leaders may have blind spots or simply be unaware of certain issues. A good example of this is a member of a historically marginalized group suggesting an internship program in a disadvantaged community, or a younger employee recommending that environmentalism and green energy be incorporated into the organization's vision statement and standard operating processes.
Conclusion
Although I enjoy offering suggestions and providing input to my supervisors, asking employees to effectively take on a leadership role without compensation or a formal title is not a solution to an actual failure of leadership. Followership is vitally important and can prepare employees for future leadership roles. But it is not, in and of itself, a remedy for poor leadership. Followers should not take it upon themselves to intervene on behalf of hands-off or actively unethical leaders. The leader is still a leader, and leaders who are unwilling to lead require organizational intervention — not simply the efforts of one follower — to correct the problem.
References
Carsten, M. K., & Uhl-Bien, M. (2017). Leader perceptions and motivation as outcomes of followership role orientation and behavior. Leadership, 1–26.
Johnson, C. E. (2021). Organizational ethics (5th ed.). SAGE Publications.
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