Followers and Leadership

Leadership is a person or group of people who have taken on the position of assisting others through motivation, good decision making, and a strong commitment to promoting change. Leaders are considered as one of the key success of management of organizations and companies. An effective leader sets clear direction, establishes goals, empowers their team towards achievement, and leads by exemplar. Leadership and motivation styles vary from individual to individual, it is essential for managers to know and understand leadership, and particular how leadership affects countries and the workplace. However, followers are just as important, without followers there would be no leaders.

Leadership has changed a great deal over time. The historical views of leadership differ dramatically from the views of modern times. In the past, leaders were seen as powerful and authoritative. Historical leaders were usually dictators, kings, prophets, or priests. They were not any average person and no one could learn to be a leader, it was an innate characteristic. Almost all historical leaders were male as well. They were rulers and used force and manipulation to get their point across and to get individuals to follow them.

Historically leadership began with the trait approach. This approach is what brought about the theory that leaders were born and never made. Another name for this approach is the great man theory. Much of the research about the trait approach was conducted in the 1930’s, 40’s, and 50’s. This theory did not look at the impact that situations may have on leadership, only traits. There were no empirical findings from the trait approach so the research ultimately ended in the 1950’s (Barnett, 2003).

Modern leaders are very di...

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