Followership Education and Reimagining Its Place in Leadership Education

Abstract

Short Description Align with this year’s conference theme, Reimagining Leadership Together, this panel discussion will provide ideas and insights about followership education, and its role and importance for leadership education in the 21st century. The panelists from diverse backgrounds and perspectives will provide their strategies and experiences of how they developed and incorporated followership into the leadership programs within their institutions. The panelist will also highlight the key differences between leadership and followership education as well as followership research in education to sustain the current emphasis on followership and promote the importance of further research.

Detailed Abstract While individuals may be reluctant to embrace a follower self-concept, the reality is that leadership success depends on flexibility and awareness in leader-to-follower transitions (Falls & Allen, 2020). As noted by Van Vugt et al. (2008), “leader and follower roles may be adopted flexibly by the same individual because in some cases it pays to be a leader and in others to be a follower” (p. 186). Adding to the challenge, Greer (2014) noted that many individuals are faced with the challenge of “simultaneously filling the roles of leader and follower,” resulting in conflicting expectations (p. 156). The relational views of leadership and followership recognize the fluid nature of the experience (Uhl‐Bien et al., 2014) and conclude that “leadership cannot be studied apart from followership” (Van Vugt et al., 2008, p. 193). Indeed, “if we are going to study the leadership process we need to stop relying on our broad labels of leader and follower and better understand the nature of leading and following” (Uhl‐Bien et al., 2014, p. 96). This panel session explores recent experiences and opportunities with followership education. The panelists will share their ideas and insights for reimagining the place of followership in leadership education.

One of the panelists, Eric Kaufman from Virginia Tech, will share his recent experience developing and co-teaching a new graduate course on “Ethics in Leader/Follower Relationships.” The course integrates Chaleff’s (2009) model of courageous followership, as well as Chaleff’s (2015) formula for intelligent disobedience. The new course reflects a critical advancement with established leadership education programs at Virginia Tech, because it places more emphasis on followership in a leadership studies concentration for an online Master’s degree program and presents a followership course option for a graduate certificate program in collaborative community leadership. Kaufman will also share insights from reimagining the leadership/followership relationship as a Möbius strip (Kaufman et al., 2021).

Dan Jenkins, Chair and Associate Professor of Leadership & Organizational Studies at the University of Southern Maine, will share resources related to followership courses and programs in higher education. Building upon the contributions to the followership education literature from Raffo (2013), Hoption (2014), Murji (2015), and Hurwitz (2017), Jenkins and Spranger (2020) offered a comprehensive survey of followership education. Accordingly, Dan will share insight from his collaboration with Dr. Spranger on recommended instructional strategies to teach followership (i.e., case studies, discussion, self-assessments & instruments, reflection, role-play, and peer assessment/feedback); highlight the key differences between leadership and followership education (i.e., a greater need to focus on language and stereotypes in followership education; a greater need to emphasize the intrinsic and extrinsic value of followership; followership is consistently presented in relationship to the leader; when compared to requisite leadership knowledge, most learners enter a leadership education space with some implicit knowledge of leadership whereas the same is not true for followership; beyond the followership taxonomies, there is little empirical data describing the characteristics, behaviors, traits, and skills of successful followers; and there is an emphasis on speaking up to the hierarchy and the tact and care required to effectively do so); and share four key strategies for increasing efficacy in followership education (i.e., focusing on language, collaboration, feedback, and common purpose).

Another panelist, Wajeeha Ghias from Pakistan, will share her teaching experience of Challef (2009) courageous followership model . She will be discussing the strategies applied to teach and develop courageous followership in undergraduate class using religious practices as a tool to develop mindset. The discussion will be focused on the experience that teaching courageous followership at the university level can enhance the abilities of individuals to question the immoral acts of their leaders rather than blindly following them. The strategies of developing courageous followership in collective Asian culture will be shared.

Malcolm North will outline the redevelopment of the new Social Change concentration of the PhD Leadership for Equity and Inclusion program at the University of Central Arkansas. Followership is an intentional component embedded in the research, leadership, and concentration core built on a follower-centered dynamic. While acknowledging and sometimes challenging the traditional hegemony of individual and hierarchical leadership, the social change track emphasizes followership in resilient communities, social movements, collective ethics, power ‘with’, change advocacy, cross-sector and multi-system collaboration, and culture and organizational change from a follower-centric systems lens. Followership modules in ethics, social change, community, and organizational classes will be discussed and where these courses have conducted research with community partners. The second focus will be the place of followership research in education to sustain the current emphasis on followership and promote further research. North will also share research projects with follower-centric themes; follower-directed change at an international non-profit organization; followers of toxic leaders; leaders as followers in organizational culture shift, and the development and validation of an instrument that measures an organization’s capacity for an ethical follower-centric culture.

The chair of this panel will be Abdurrahim Hocagil. As a recent graduate, Dr. Hocagil is currently serving as an organizing council member of Teaching Followers Courage platform where a community of academics and practitioners certified in the application of Courageous Followership concept in curricula, workshops and organizational culture. The community comprises educators dedicated to teaching people followership in order to be strong and courageous. The TFC community committed to helping improve outcomes by teaching leadership together with followership. In addition to introducing panelists and meeting timing requirements, Dr. Hocagil will also facilitate the Q&A session and try to stimulate conversation with his knowledge and experience on Followership education and its role on reimagining leadership education in the 21st century.