Our Stories

Marc’s Story

It started a number of years ago after a run of career success that culminated in an executive level position. Everything was going great: I was appreciated, and promoted regularly. I was even put into a program for high potential staff as one of the leaders of tomorrow. Then I got a new boss and we clashed. Everything changed.

Within a year my performance appraisals started to slip. How could this happen when I was continuing to do the same things? Had I changed? No, my technical skills were as strong as ever and I still felt engaged and passionate about my work; my first thoughts were that my boss wasn't 'getting me'. I think this happens to a lot of us - we enounter a new situation, we don't adapt, and we blame it on the situation instead of ourselves. This led me to wonder if I was really doing all the right things. Is it true that being a good follower is only about having good technical skills and being engaged?

At the same time, I noticed other people with similar challenges to mine. I realized something was missing in how we understand work. Perhaps there is more to being good at a job than technical skills and engagement.

Then I had one of those wonderful Eureka! moments. There is a flip side to leadership – followship – that is equally important. Perhaps it is technical skills, engagement, and followship that make the complete picture. I became determined to make this invisible skill visible and figure out the pieces of the puzzle. Fortunately, that’s also about the time I met Sam.

Sam's Story

I was still rather new to the company when I met Marc. It had been 8 months since I relocated – moving 1,500 miles to take a position with the company that had just bought my company.  Now I had become a part of a huge, global organization.  My track record, leadership experience through two previous mergers and “having my house in order” at the time of acquisition, all played a big part in why I was made an attractive offer for an executive post.

I was working hard but couldn’t seem to find my stride. Fortunately, that’s also about the time I met Marc. He told me about his Eureka! and it didn’t take me long to know he was on to something big.  It occurred to me that my problem was that I hadn’t adapted to fit my boss’s style. My new boss’s style was really different from what I was used to - requiring frequent updates, lots of data, lots of reports and everything with a deadline that had to be met.  My new company was also really different from what I was used to - much more oversight and approvals, tightly managed communications, and a breakneck speed of execution.

But I was continuing to operate the way that had made me successful at my old company.  By making the invisible followship concepts visible, within months I developed a solid rapport with my boss, felt engaged and an integral part of the action, started getting excellent feedback, and definitely felt like I had my groove back.  Followship had turned everything around.

Those early lessons have been improved by years of followship research: focus groups, relevant scientific literature, interviews, and testing ideas in the workplace. The result is FLIPskills, the evolution of HR thinking. Simply put, better followers enable better teams, better leaders, better organizations, and a more enjoyable workplace. We are all followers and we play an essential role when we perform strongly in this capacity. It is time for FLIP: Followers and Leaders, the Invaluable Partnership.

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