Companies glorify their leaders and praise their visionary entrepreneurs, “but…we should focus [more] on the followers—the people who get things done,” according to Nancy Lublin, CEO of DoSomething, writing in a column recently published by Fast Company.
Her stance is that the world needs people who can follow orders intelligently. “The key word is ‘intelligently,’ ” she reports. “Good followers ask good questions. They probe their leaders. They crunch the numbers to ensure that their visionary boss’s gorgeous plan actually works.”
Change needs to start at an organizational level, she adds. While CEOs represent the smallest portion of the nation’s labor pyramid, a disproportionate amount of time and money is spent grooming them and then honoring their achievements with hefty pay packages.
Lublin concludes, “Not everyone can create the Google of the future, and many of those who don’t will think they’re failures…The working world would be a happier place if more of us aspired to roles that were just right—if we valued job fit and performance at every level and stopped overemphasizing the very top.”
Source: NAA’s Industry Insider
Learn More in New Orleans
Founding editor of Fast Company magazine Bill Taylor will present a Thought Leader session about business management trends from 11:45 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday, June 26, at the 2010 NAA Education Conference & Exposition in New Orleans. Visit .