We've blogged before about Derek Sivers' points about followership -- so humorously described by the Dancing Guy video. Some quotes from Derek's TED talk -- "The first follower is an unrecognized form of leadership" and "Have the courage to follow and show others how to follow".Michelle and I have also talked about change agents and how crucial they are to the success of the change effort. I think that how Derek describes the first followers and their importance to the start of a movement, closely parallels our thoughts on change agents -- somebody with the courage to stand up and say "hey, there might be something to this new stuff so I'm going to give it a try, and I'll talk other people into trying it, too!".Give your change agents everything they need in order to be effective and to bring other people into the movement. Have you communicated everything to them that they need to know, have you given them all the needed resources to be successful, have you been very clear on what it is you need them to do, have you provided a forum for them to give you feedback -- in other words, have you enable them to be successful first followers.Finding people with the courage to be first followers can make or break your change effort... nurture and empower your change agents!
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