How many times have you have you heard the term leadership in the last two weeks? Most organisations focus on their leaders, offering management training and leadership training and development opportunities to the bright young leaders of the future.

How many times have your heard of term followership in the last two weeks? We all know leaders need followers but do we really place as much emphasis on followers as we should? Probably not which is surprising because leadership is an interactive activity: leaders depend on followers and vice versa.

Why do people follow? What makes a great follower? If the leaders of today understood what is that makes people want to follow and what it is that makes them good at it, then they’d be able to create followers that have a chance of becoming great leaders of the future.

People won’t just follow someone just because they’re told to. A leader can’t just say ‘follow me’ and expect people to follow without question. There has to be a reason, a purpose and a greater good.

So how do we create great followers?

Here are five tips for creating great followers

1. Encourage your followers to think for themselves; Don’t restrict them, allow them to be creative and innovative
2. Encourage your followers to embrace change
3. Allow your followers to challenge you; they’ll grow from it
4. Influence your followers to be solutions focussed
5. Demand open and honest communication at all times

As Dwight D Eisenhower once said “Effective leadership is the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because they want to do it.”

With this in mind I suppose the key to becoming a great follower is having a willingness to follow. Ask yourself this question; will people be willing to follow you if you’re restrictive as a leader?

The answer is NO!!

Remember, today’s followers are our leaders of the future!

Contact us today for more information about our management training and leadership training and development courses for more information.

Research by the ILM has found that three quarters (73%) of women believe there are barriers preventing them from progressing to the top levels of management.

It also sheds new light on the nature of these barriers. Alongside well-known obstacles to advancement such as maternity and childcare-related issues, the findings reveal a number of less conspicuous, but nevertheless critical, factors.

In summary, the research reveals that women managers are impeded in their careers by lower ambitions and expectations. Compared to their male counterparts, they tend to lack self-belief and confidence – which leads to a cautious approach to career opportunities – and follow a less straightforward career path. The higher expectations and increased confidence of male managers propels them into management roles on average three years earlier than women.

The research shows that at the outset of their career women have less clarity of career direction than men, and lower career ambitions and expectations. Over half (52%) of male managers had a ‘fair idea’ or ‘clear ambition’ to work in a particular role, compared with 45% of women managers. Fewer women than men (50% vs 62%) expected to become managers. Twice as many women as men did not want to become a manager.

The gap in ambition

The career ambitions of women managers also lag behind those of men. In general, women set their sights lower than men do, and are more likely to limit their ambitions to more junior ranks of management. Fewer women than men expect to reach a general manager or director level by the end of their careers.

Female managers also have lower career confidence. Men are more confident across all age groups, with 70% of men having high or quite high levels of self-confidence, compared to 50% of women. Half of women managers admit to feelings of self-doubt, but only 31% of men do. The research also found that women with low confidence have lower expectations of reaching a leadership and management role and are actually less likely to achieve their career ambitions.

This lack of confidence is evident in women’s more cautious approach to applying for jobs or promotions: 20% of men will apply for a role despite only partially meeting its job description, compared to 14% of women. Climbing the career ladder is notoriously competitive, and women’s hesitation in applying for more challenging roles inevitably puts them at a disadvantage.

Women are also more likely than men to voluntarily step off the career ladder, impeding their career progress: 42% had taken statutory maternity leave, and 21% had left work to care for children; only 9% of men had taken paternity leave, and just 2% had left work to care for children.

The research suggests female managers are more likely to defer having children, because of the impact on their careers: 41% of women surveyed are childless, compared to 28% of men.

Despite significant differences elsewhere, the research shows no gap in satisfaction between male and female managers. When it comes to management careers, women tend to aim lower and settle for less than male colleagues with the same skills and experience.

Given the shortage of women in senior leadership and management positions, without real change it seems only a matter of time before some form of legislation is introduced to redress the balance. But the research suggests increased regulation would prove divisive and found that almost half (47%) of women managers are in favour of quotas to increase female representation on boards, compared to a quarter (24%) of men. By contrast, nearly two thirds (62%) of women are in favour of some form of positive action, a view shared by 42% of men. If organisations want to avoid the imposition of external targets or quotas, they need to act decisively, and this report highlights a number of areas to address.

Seizing the initiative

The ILM believe that Government quotas should be viewed as a sign of leadership failure. In order to preclude the need for external regulations, organisations should take the lead voluntarily and set transparent, self-imposed targets for female representation at board and senior executive levels.
Gender equality at the highest levels is evidently a significant leadership challenge. As such, senior leaders need to take accountability for their company’s talent pipeline, and make it a commercial priority to proactively identify, develop and promote high potential leaders of both sexes.

The research also found men and women enjoy equal access to training and development, which suggests employers have an opportunity to target their development spend more effectively to address gender imbalance. Employers can maximise the impact of their investment in leadership development by tailoring it to the differing needs of male and female managers. Coaching and mentoring, in particular, offer highly effective ways of addressing women’s lower confidence and ambition, and encouraging them to realise their leadership potential.

To stop talented women opting out of leadership careers, we need to get away from the male breadwinner career model and make senior leadership roles more appealing to people with family demands. Career advancement should reflect skills and capabilities, with less emphasis on time served. Flexible working, job and career sharing and work-life balance policies have an important part
to play.

Recruitment practices also need to evolve if we are to break the cycle of business as usual. Recruitment consultants should be encouraged to widen the net and identify a balance of candidates of both sexes for board level vacancies. At the same time, senior leaders should push themselves to take more risks when recruiting, by focusing on talent and potential over experience.

Source – ILM