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When subordinates do not follow: A typology of subordinate resistance as perceived by leaders

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Abstract

Whereas a plethora of research investigated subordinates who accept their leaders’ influence attempts (i.e., those who follow), we focus here on the reversed perspective, namely subordinates who decide not to follow their leaders’ requests. For example, a subordinate may intentionally lower their effort, regularly pass-off work tasks to colleagues, or take the leader for a fool. The purpose of the present study was to develop a conceptual account of this phenomenon. More specifically, we aimed to develop a classification of subordinate resistance as perceived by leaders that can guide future research on this multifaceted phenomenon. To achieve this goal, we conducted 40 semi-structured interviews with organizational leaders. We utilized topic modeling to map out five categories of subordinate resistance (i.e., entitlement, contact seeking/avoiding, effort minimization, emotionally fluctuating communication, and undermining team cohesion). In a second study (N = 1,229), we investigated the frequency with which leaders experienced each category of resistance, and explored leader-related antecedents (demographics, cognitive ability, personality) we well as situational antecedents (industry). We discuss a proposed nomological net of subordinate resistance, consequences that subordinates (and leaders) might face when engaging in (experiencing) subordinate resistance, and how the person–situation debate may contribute to understanding when subordinate resistance occurs.

Section snippets

Theoretical background

Speaking to the notion that subordinates actively shape leadership (Oc et al., 2023), investigating a leader’s perception of subordinate resistance is one puzzle piece to understanding how subordinates’ non-following can influence how leadership can take place. This is because the leaders’ mental representation and perception of subordinates’ behaviors drive leadership outcomes. In this regard, research showed that how leaders perceive their subordinates’ actions impact their decision-making

Topic modeling

In Study 1, we applied topic modeling to identify facets of subordinate resistance. Topic modeling enables a “bottom-up” inductive analysis of qualitative data based on an unsupervised machine learning algorithm that carves out clusters of words that co-occur (Banks et al., 2018, Kobayashi et al., 2018, Tonidandel et al., 2021). In contrast to grounded theory approaches that solely relies on human coders, topic modeling represents an automated and data-driven process that paves the way for

Results

Our guiding research question asked how leaders experience subordinate resistance and how these perceived instances of subordinate resistance can be categorized. To preview our findings, the topic modeling provided empirical support for five distinct facets, namely (1) effort minimization, (2) undermining team cohesion, (3) emotionally fluctuating communication, (4) entitlement, and (5) contact-seeking/avoiding. Next, we illustrate the five facets of subordinate resistance in more detail and

Study 2: Prevalence and antecedents of subordinate resistance

We conducted a follow-up study to address the second part of our research question, namely how often leaders experience each of the five identified categories of subordinate resistance in their working life. Furthermore, we wanted to explore how leader-related antecedents (i.e., demographics, cognitive ability, personality) and the situational context (i.e., industry) are associated with the prevalence of subordinate resistance and the leaders’ perceptions of the degree of destructiveness of

General discussion

In this study, we developed a classification of different types of subordinate resistance that leaders perceive in their daily working life. In doing so, we add nuance to the followership literature, which has thus far either focused on followers who follow (Chaleff, 1995, Kelley, 1992, Zaleznik, 1965) or scattered instances of descriptions of subordinate resistance (Güntner et al., 2021, Tepper et al., 2001). Using topic modeling to analyze data obtained through interviews with leaders, we

Funding

There is no specific funding to report for this research.

Declaration of Competing Interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

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