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Are You A Leader Or A Follower?

Do you think you are a leader or a follower? Do you find when in a group of people, you take charge. Perhaps you are a manager or supervisor who manages a group of people very well with out challenge. Perhaps you tend to fade into the background when in a group. You have no desire to be in charge, and prefer to be managed or supervised. I consider myself a Leader. Not simply because I have a staff I manage, but I enjoy it and I don't find it challenging. I delegate responsibilities well and I have high expectations for all of my staff. In my personal life, I take the lead in my family as well. I am usually the go to person for siblings and other relatives. So which are you?

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  • 9 votes
twshield 8 Mar 9
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20 comments

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I'm a good, strong right hand. I'll follow you if I respect you. If I lose respect for you, I'll walk away and let you burn. I'll follow, but only until it is obvious that you can't lead. Then I'll take over. Or I'll go my own way. Am I leader or a follower?

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I think being a good leader or a good follower require similar talents: knowing how to perform your role, being a good communicator, and not taking anything personally. Whoever is best qualified should be the leader, and if that turns out to be me, I can enjoy it, but playing a support role well requires a talent not everyone possesses either. All said, my default mode is hermit!

skado Level 9 Mar 19, 2018
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I'm a pragmatic leader..after managing kitchens for. 16 or 17 years you learn how to lead by example and by letting your staff establish the flow of the daily operations.Also by knowing who is an underdeveloped potential leader..and giving them more responsibles incrementally..and I enjoyed it.

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I'm a pragmatic leader..after managing kitchens for. 16 or 17 years you learn how to lead by example and by letting your staff establish the flow of the daily operations.Also by knowing who is an underdeveloped potential leader..and giving them more responsibles incrementally..

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It really depends on the situation. Mostly I don't care to be in a group at all. If the person in the lead handles things well then I follow. If the group is reasonable and willing, I have filled a lead roll. Honestly I rather just do what I need to do and go back to my cave.

AmyLF Level 7 Mar 10, 2018
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I don't know that the term leader applies to me, but I'm definitely a type A personality.

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If you relied on someone to create a job for you are a follower.

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I do both and I do neither, I'm not bloody minded just realsitic and comfortable with both depending on circumstance 🙂

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I don't follow as such. I like to let others decide what to do, but if I don't ant to do it I won't. I can make decisions quickly, I am a strategist, but I don't want people following me, or wanting me to make their decisions for them.

2

I've never been either. I have no desire to lead, and I refuse to follow. I think that's one reason I never felt right in religion.

3

I netiher lead nor follow but just go my own way.

1

Whyen I was in a new situation, I laid low and scoped out the scene and the people until I had a grasp of the situation. Then, I assumed a leadership role.

2

Neither. I'm a do-whatever-I-feel-like-, I-neither-participate-in-nor-recognize-the-legitimacy-of-such-a-system-er. In practice, that tends to equate to "outcast." Idngaf.

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I'm a leader, but it's usually not by choice. I'm the geek who generally makes the companies I work for run smoothly while some executive(s) takes all the credit and most of the cash.

@twshield That sounds like it might be similar to the bosses I had while at Intuit filing amendments and auditing payroll accounts. The company simply didn't care if the supervisors had the slightest capability of performing the work that their subordinates did. While I worked on the amendment team, they promoted a woman with a brand new degree to supervise a department that she'd been transferred off due to extremely poor performance. I, personally checked their work, tracked all in a spreadsheet and returned any errors for correction. Almost everyone on that team would have between 2-5% of their work sent back to them. No one, other than her, exceeded a 5% error rate on my sheet, but she managed to exceed 20%. They were all extremely pissed, because they didn't know who to ask for help if they ever needed it. I had 4 different bosses during my time there, three who did actually understand what we did and could help if needed, the other simply didn't care what we did. I hope your boss at least understands the basics of what you do.

@twshield I wish we had better bosses. Mine's a little fun, but a total salesman and a lot like POTUS. I started my current job on 6/4/10 though I only have 2 people who work for me, one who's been here longer than I and the other for almost 6 years. I've made their jobs really easy, almost foolproof with spreadsheets that keep everything balanced. I did that with mine too and now I'm bored. My only excitement is when get to see to fine examples of where our government reward people for committing fraud or when one of our new revolving door employees doesn't understand the pay schedule.

@twshield Being detail oriented is a very good trait to have. I'd almost consider that should be a requirement in your profession and a trait I want everyone in care of my health to possess. For me, it means I don't have to calculate everyone's individual payroll checks or try to figure out which pallets were added to inventory and which one have shipped. I let macros and formulas I wrote up to 20 years ago do that for me.

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I have never been a leader, but I found I wasn't a good follower. Perhaps that is why I'm an independent contractor and keep a limited social circle

@twshield I like that

1

It depends on circumstance.

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Neither. I am a loner and just do things my way to suit me. If you would like to join in, fine, if not, fine.

This is meant as a compliment, and not saying you have the lifestyle, but you remind me of "Mike" from Breaking Bad. You look like him and the above statement sounds like something he'd say. And kind of a no nonsense dude that has lived a fair number of years.....

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Both, depending on the situation. Follow people that are more knowledgeable that I in situations that matter. Lead when it seems right. Collaborate by default.

JeffB Level 6 Mar 9, 2018
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I'm definitely a follower. I had a teacher in 7th or 8th grade that would repeatedly tell the classroom that we've got to be leaders! Even back then I remember thinking, not everyone can be a leader. You have to have some people who are followers. Otherwise you aren't leading anyone! I think part of why my marriage ended in divorce was because we're both followers. Someone has to take charge!

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Have been charged with being leader when I got thrown out of YMCA Camp at 15, but prefer to be in background now, being retired.

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