![]() ![]() ![]() The problem is that followers get short shrift in the management literature, where they are described largely in terms of their leaders’ qualities. Regrettably, however, it’s becoming harder to get people to follow. For leaders to lead, they need not only exceptional talent but also the ability to attract followers. It’s hardly surprising, therefore, that management scholars focus relentlessly on the attributes of successful leadership.īut in our understandable effort to grasp and master the skills of leadership, we tend to lose sight of the fact that there are two parts to the leadership equation. ![]() In any business climate, good leadership is perhaps the most important competitive advantage a company can have. They are needed both to change organizations and to produce results. They motivate us to go places that we would never otherwise go. Leaders, quite rightly, are the heroes of the corporate epic (a few leader-villains notwithstanding). Then debilitating resentment and animosity can give way to mutual understanding and productivity-and a limping organization can start to thrive. Whether followers perceive a leader as an all-knowing father figure, as an authoritative yet unconditionally loving mother figure, or as a brother or sister who isn’t necessarily a model of good behavior, the leader can manage transferential ties by bringing unconscious projections to light. ![]() He notes that they have evolved as our family structures have changed. The author explains the most common types of transference-paternal, maternal, and sibling-and shows how they play out in the workplace. This is unfortunate, because a solid understanding of transference can yield great insight into organizational behavior and endow you with the wisdom and compassion to be a tremendous leader. Sigmund Freud discovered this dynamic when working with his patients and called it “transference.” But as important as it is, the concept remains little understood outside the realm of clinical psychoanalysis. He looks closely at the often irrational tendency to relate to a leader as some important person from the past-a parent, a sibling, a close friend, or even a nanny. In this article, psychoanalyst, anthropologist, and management consultant Michael Maccoby delves into the unconscious recesses of followers’ minds. What most analyses seem to ignore is that followers have their own motivations and are as powerfully driven to follow as leaders are to lead. Regrettably, they get short shrift in the management literature, where they are described as merely responding to their leaders’ charisma or caring attitudes. In trying to understand how leadership works, however, we often lose sight of the fact that followers are a crucial part of the equation. ![]()
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December 2022
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