In September the University of Toronto Press will publish my next book. It’s titled Why We Follow Leaders – and Why We Don’t. These four are among the questions to which the book provides answers. First, what are our rewards for following? Second, what are our punishments for not following? Third, what are our rewards for not following? Fourth, what are our punishments for following?
What happened in Ukraine in the last week testifies to the subtitle of my first book on followership – How Followers are Creating Change and Changing Leaders.* An example: Ukrainians who by the tens of thousands just took to the streets to protest the president’s firing of his defense minister.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has done a masterful job of leading his country since in early 2022 the Russians launched their unprovoked attack. His leadership under extraordinarily difficult circumstances has generally been so outstanding that, unless there’s a dramatic change, history will regard him as one of the great leaders of the first half of the 21st century.
But precisely because he is a democrat not an autocrat, Zelinsky is not immune to the power and influence of his followers. To their capacity to create change and to change him or, at least, to change his course of action. Which is exactly what just happened. As a direct result of mass protests – repeated demonstrations against something that Zelensky had done, which was to fire his popular defense minister – he reversed course.
The president’s action provoked a reaction – an extremely strong one. Ukrainians took to the streets not once but repeatedly. Over and over again until the president decided, in less than a week, to backtrack. Zelensky did not exactly reverse his decision, but he did revise and revamp it. The leader was obliged by his followers to change his course of action to the point where the country’s military was transformed. Almost overnight the old guard was effectively replaced. Replaced by a younger generation of military leaders much more familiar with the technologies that in the last year have distinguished Ukraine’s military. That have set it apart from, and above, most other militaries in the world.
Follower power.
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*The title of the book is Followership (Harvard Business School Press, 2008).
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