Followers at the time of the COVID-19
Sebastien Baert
Exec. Coach 🇫🇷🇬🇧 Partner with us to unlock your Leadership Potential and propel your Ambitions forward | +150 leaders and senior executives supported | Formerly at Sanofi & BNP Paribas | Partner@BignondeKeyser
In his recent contribution, the Professor Manfred Kets de Vries from INSEAD asks the following exciting question "Are we stuck with the leaders we deserve?"
Interestingly, the question implies that leaders be the result of what followers do or don't do.
It echoes what R. Spillane and J-E. Jouillé (ref. Philosophy of Leadership: The Power of Authority) suggest when they write "we cannot understand leadership as such unless we attend to the reasons that motivate followership." (2015)
The author of the article argues that the motivations behind the Trump election can be found in "the darker feelings and frustrations within segments of the population [of the USA]." Eventually, those low-morale motives mobilize the corresponding behaviours in the so-called well-suited leader.
Yesterday, in the French newspaper Le Monde, the journalist Sylvie Kauffmann ("Face au coronavirus, un monde sans leader." argued that from the COVID-19 crisis emerges a world without leaders.
To me, such a view disregards how the darker feelings and frustrations of humankind can express themselves through the fabric of leaders.
I would claim those fears and frustrations (often directed towards others and the uncertainty about the future) are to some extent in any one of us.
Moreover, history shows that when a significant number of group members calls for a leader based on those motives, the "fabric of leaders" will sooner or later mobilize a leader willing to address them at any cost - often in the course of the war.
Hence, as the author of the article says, people all over the world must themselves [not only] have the strength to ask, "What types of leaders do we require if we are to move forward?" but also what are their motives behind their choices.
Would those motives end up mobilize the virtuous qualities in their leaders or the bad ones?
The crisis and the rise of anxiety and suffering created will make those self-reflective stances of any followers not only more challenging but also more critical for our shared future.
Owner and Principal Producer at Talking Leaders
4yAre we talking about a modern problem here? Was there ever a golden age of leadership? Or are you calling for something unprecedented?
Founder Director Heresy Consulting. A Jungian approach to coaching supervision and consulting.
4yTo be fair, they have been under scrutiny for some time. A WEF Survey in 2015 suggested that over 80% of respondents believed we were experiencing a leadership crisis, and it is hard to disagree. It would be wholly disingenuous after all to suggest that the system we have created was not a direct reflection of the capabilities and psychology of both the leaders who created it, and the development institutions and practices that created them. Now above all we must be honest and take responsibility for what is in effect a deeply flawed approach to both leadership and organisation...as we know from research and development practice, only then will we be able to learn and move forwards. What got us here, created what we have, and will not move us forwards.... A good start would be to return to good psychology and reflective practice....
Executive Coaching | People Development and leadership Trainer | SOMA Breath instructor | Psychometric Assessment
4ySebastien!! I love metaphors it intrigue my mind!! And here with “fabric of leaders” I like the metaphor of “fabric” especially when it implies the intentional choices of leaders about their visible characteristics and actions taken at certain times.