This dissertation is composed of three manuscripts, all of which focus on the role of followers in leadership. Manuscript 1 investigates followers’ preferences for leader characteristics. Guided by social identity theory and the similarity-attraction paradigm, followers’ preferences were examined using a vignette-type approach. The results show that follower self-worth moderated the relationship between leader-follower similarity and follower preference for leader characteristics. Under conditions of low self-worth, followers preferred leaders whose characteristics were opposite from their own; conversely, under conditions of high self-worth, followers preferred leaders whose characteristics were similar to their own. Despite the importance of leaders, attention is drawn towards followers’ cognitions about themselves. Manuscript 2 argues that followers are equal exchange partners with their leaders, thus actively contributing to the nature of their relationships with their leader. Consistent with social exchange theory, there was a significant relationship between followers’ pro-social behaviors associated with secure attachment style and conscientiousness and leaders’ pro-social behaviors such as helping and trust. In addition, anti-social follower behaviors begat anti-social leader behaviors; followers’ fearful attachment style predicted abusive supervisory behaviors. These findings contrast leader-centric notions, and they emphasize that followers can participate in determining the nature of their relationships with leaders. Manuscript 3 evaluates bidirectional influence between leaders and followers on three work values: humanistic beliefs, organizational beliefs, and work ethic. Although there was no support for upward influence, the short-term nature of the study may have limited the opportunity for sequential bidirectional influence to occur. There was, however, a significant downward influence upon followers’ organizational beliefs. These results suggest that leader influence may be particularly effective, or followers may be particularly vulnerable to leader influence on some dimensions (e.g., the importance of the collective) versus others (e.g., individualism at work, and the extent to which work fulfills people). Finally, in the general discussion, directions for future research are discussed. / Thesis (Ph.D, Management) -- Queen's University, 2009-08-05 17:20:43.173

During these past twenty years, we witnessed some important changes in the organizational context and environment that motivate scholars and management academics to examine the topic of followership more deeply. Then, in the leadership literature, we noticed the emergence of a small but growing number of articles that are devoted to this topic and that challenge the previous conceptions of leadership. Numerous scholars developed a more contemporary conception of followership, in which they conceive the role of followers as essential to ensure the organizational performance. Consequently, as it is already the case for leadership, many management academics and practitioners recommend organizations to invest and devote part of their time and energy to the development and training of followers. In this context and in front of such recommendations, the question of desirability is addressed along this thesis. More precisely, the purpose of this work is to discuss if it is really desirable to develop followers in the perspective of followers, leaders and organizations. In order to address the research issue, the thesis is divided in two parts. The first one is based on three dominant models from the literature and specifies what we mean by followership. A personal conception of effective followership is then developed and includes two important attributes: an appropriate level of engagement and an active critical thinking. In the second part, the question of desirability is discussed in the perspective of followers, leaders and organizations. For this purpose, we gathered a wide range of information that comes from a personal survey, several theoretical concepts and other empirical data.

Known for their promotion of premier leadership, the FFA Organization has been known to produce leaders of quality. Followership is a large part of being a leader, knowing how to lead and understand whom you are leading. This thesis looks to highlight the need for follower-focused leadership. It is a descriptive study designed to explore the ways in which Texas FFA Chapter officers view followership. It also examined the perceptions of Texas FFA Chapter officers in relation to how often certain followership behaviors occur within their chapters. Agricultural science teachers were notified to give their chapter officers the opportunity to fill out the mailed surveys. This study uses a valid and reliable researcher designed questionnaire. Surveys include a quantitative Likert scale design as well as an open-ended question regarding good follower qualities. Findings suggested that officers surveyed showed a limited knowledge of followership. However, they did designate followers as playing a role within their chapter. Followership education could enhance the already existing leadership development within the FFA Organization, as leaders learn to focus on whom they are leading.

In this thesis, titled Followership constructs and behaviours in a complex organisation: A South African perspective, the researcher aimed to expand on the current literature within the field of followership by providing a complex organisation perspective in the South African public sector. Employing a qualitative approach, the study investigated how employees at a South African metropolitan municipality socially construct their followership. The study focused specifically on follower implicit followership theories (FIFTs) in a complex environment. Interviews were conducted with 27 participants to explore their beliefs about followership, the enactment of their followership, and the factors that contribute to how they enact their followership. The results suggest that followers’ self-schemas can be characterised around beliefs that are either self-focused, leader-focused, organisation-focused, or a combination thereof. Findings also indicate that followers can simultaneously hold beliefs that include characteristics that are associated with passive schemas, such as deference to leaders; as well as those that are considered to be proactive, such as challenging leaders and taking initiative. The results further reveal that follower behaviour is influenced more positively by intrinsic individual factors compared to external organisational or leadership factors; whilst the converse is also indicated. In respect of organisational factors, the inherent political nature and rigid structure of the organisation are the primary emerging themes of challenges for enactment of ideal followership. The study concludes that individual followers simultaneously hold beliefs across the continuum of follower self-schemas from passive to proactive; however, the activation of the behaviours across the continuum is dependent on the follower’s perception of the appropriate schema in response to the situation or environment. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2021. / Business Management / PhD / Unrestricted

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In a society fixated on leaders, where does that leave followers? Followership highlights the follower in the leadership process, examines who are followers, and explores how and why people follow. Much of the existing literature on followership has focused on classifying followers into follower types. However, less is known about why an employee might enact a particular follower role. The purpose of this dissertation is to understand how leaders influence the likelihood that followers to enact a particular follower role orientation, either coproducing or passive. Specifically, this research contributes to understanding the impact of transformational leadership on follower motivation and follower role orientation. An additional contribution of this dissertation is to establish the theoretical mechanism that explains the connection between leader behavior and follower role orientation by integrating self-determination theory (SDT) into the process of followership. Through SDT, we gain understanding of the origins of these roles by explaining their underlying motivation. Study 1 consisted of sequential experiments with a between-subject design that used distinct vignettes for transformational leadership and work-based need satisfaction. Findings support the causal relationship between transformational leadership and follower needs satisfaction; however, the casual relationship between follower need satisfaction and follower role orientation was not significant. Study 2 was a two-wave field study of full-time employed adults located in the United States. Results from Study 2 indicated that transformational leadership relates to coproduction follower orientation through competence need satisfaction and to passive follower orientation through autonomy/relatedness needs satisfaction. These findings contribute to our understanding of how different follower role orientations develop.

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Arguably, the leadership demonstrated by a school principal determines the success of an educational organization, a school. This viewpoint, grounded in literature, maintains that the role of a leader (school principal) determines the effectiveness of followers (teachers). While accurate, this premise does not consider the role of followers to influence the significance of the leader. Therefore, it is appropriate to examine the teacher-principal relationship from the perspective of the follower. Specifically, what motivates teachers to follow a school principal? A qualitative research design was employed; data collection consisted of interviews, a questionnaire and survey, where a limited number of semi-structured open-ended questions were posited. Conclusively, the study identified an exemplary followership style as predominant among participants (followers), and several specific and general professional qualities and personal characteristics, expected and modeled by principals (leaders). Collectively, style, criteria, and rationale established that active followership is an essential component of the teacher-principal relationship. / Graduate / 0525 / rammon@uvic.ca

Syftet med denna uppsats är att på grundval av tidigare forskning sammanställa vad vi anser aktivt efterföljarskap att innebära. Detta för att sedan skapa en djupare förståelse för hur aktiva efterföljare bidrar till upprätthållandet av organisationskultur. En fallstudie på Maxi ICA Stormarknad Vetlanda har tillämpats som undersökningsdesign, med en induktiv ansats. En kvalitativ metod har använts där fokusgrupper, intervjuer, observationer och granskning av organisatoriska dokument har genomförts för att producera den empiriska datan.

Les interactions de l’équipe de travail et l’efficacité de celles-ci sont constitutives d’un système hiérarchique préétabli composé notamment de dyades verticales. Afin d’étudier cette dyade, ce travail doctoral s’intéresse aux rôles sociaux associés au statut de chacun des protagonistes de la dyade verticale (i.e., leader pour le chef et suiveur pour le subordonné) et considère le leadership.L’influence du suiveur et de ses comportements sur le leader et le leadership est de plus en plus considérée. Cependant, les comportements du suiveur influençant le leader restent inexplorés. Ce travail doctoral plurisdisciplinaire (i.e., psychologie et informatique affective) vise donc à mettre en évidence les comportements du suiveur influençant le leader ainsi que les mécamises sous-jacents à cette influence.Pour cela, nous nous sommes intéressés aux comportements non verbaux (CNV) du suiveur en tant qu’indices sociaux pouvant influencer le leader et ses comportements. Les principes de la cognition sociale sont appliqués dans cette thèse pour étudier l’évaluation cognitive réalisée par le leader, au travers de l’activation des caractéristiques utilisées pour catégoriser les suiveurs : les théories implicites du followership (IFTs).L’étude de l’évaluation cognitive du leader se confronte à de nombreuses difficultés, notamment méthodologiques. Ainsi, un travail préliminaire essentiel de ce travail doctoral s’est attaché à traduire et valider en français une échelle d’évaluation des IFTs. La première étude exploratoire utilise des images d’agents virtuels pour explorer plusieurs CNV pouvant activer les IFTs du leader de manière explicite. La deuxième étude propose une analyse de vidéos d’entraînements d’équipes médicales pré-hospitalières pour étudier dynamiquement d’autres CNV intervenant dans la perception du followership. En troisième étude, les CNV observés dans les études précédentes ont été implémentés dans un agent virtuel placé en interaction avec des leaders médicaux. Une tâche de Go / No Go a permis par la suite d’étudier l’activation implicite des IFTs. Enfin, une dernière étude quantitative transversale a tenté d’étudier l’influence de l’évaluation cognitive du suiveur par le leader sur les comportements de leadership.Les résultats de ces études suggèrent que certaines caractéristiques affichées dans les CNV (i.e., dominance, support apporté au leader) peuvent activer les IFTs du leader. De plus, l’évaluation cognitive semble avoir une influence sur les comportements de leadership choisi.Nous discuterons les résultats obtenus et présenterons les contributions scientifiques et pédagogiques de cette thèse. Nous ouvrirons notre réflexion au positionnement épistémologique nécessaire à l’étude des IFTs, ainsi qu’à l’utilisation des agents virtuels dans l’étude de la catégorisation. Le but applicatif de ce travail doctoral est l’implémentation de CNV chez des subordonnés virtuels médicaux dans un serious game permettant la formation de leader médicaux. / Interactions in teamwork and their efficiency are based on a hierarchical system including verticale dyads. This research studies leadership through the social roles link to the hierarchical status of the vertical dyad (i.e., leader for the chief and follower for the subordinate).The influence of follower on leader and leadership is increasingly considered. However, the follower’s behaviors are still unexplored. This multidisciplinary doctoral work (i.e., psychology and affective computing) tries to highlight the influence of follower’s behavior on the leader, and the underlying process of this influence.To do so, we used the follower’s nonverbal behaviors (CNV) as the social clues that can influence the leader and his behaviors. The principles of social cognition are applied in this thesis to study the cognitive evaluation made by the leader. We worked on the activation of the caracteristics used to categorize followers, the implicit followership theories (IFTs).The study of the cognitive evaluation made by the leader comes we multiple issues, including methological ones. Thus, a preliminary work of translation and validation of a scale evaluating the IFTs was realized. The first exploratory study used images of virtual agents displaying CNV that could explicitly activate leaders’ IFTs. We complete these result through an analysis of a corpus of videos filming medical teams’ training. This study allowed us to observe dynamic CNV that could influence the perception of followership. In a third study, we implemented the CNV of the two previous studies in a virtual agent. Medical leaders had to interact with it, and implicit activation of IFTs was collected using a Go / No Go protocol. Finally, using a quantitative approach, we studied the influence of cognitive evaluation of the leader on his leadership behaviors.Results suggest that some caracteristics displayed in CNV (i.e., dominance and support) can activate the leaders’ IFTs. Moreover, the cognitive evaluation of the leader seems to influence his leadership behaviors.We will discuss the results and explain the scientifical and pédagogical contributions of this thesis. We will analyse our problematic through multiple angles, including the epistemologycal point of view allowing the study of IFTs, and the use of virtual agents in the research field of categorization process. The practical application of the doctoral work is the implementation of CNV in virtual subordinates for the deployement of a serious game for medical team leader.