Toward an exploration of follower's implicit followership theories of Mashhad's large organizations using a qualitative approach

Followership is a developing paradigm in organizational behavior which focusesmainly on followers. The goal of this study is to explore follower’s implicitfollowership theories (IFTs) which entail an analysis of follower’s views andperception about followership. For this purpose, based on a phenomenologicalapproach, semi-structured interviews with employees of large public and privateorganizations, in Mashhad were analyzed by exploratory content analysis. A total of25 categories of implicit theories were detected in 5 prototypes and 5 antiprototypes.Followership prototypes consist of constructive perception of work, jobcompetencies, mighty arm of leader, moral virtues and initiation pattern; five antiprototypeswere named as role deviances including destructive behaviors,obedience, incompetency, indifference and blue color. Reflecting on the findings, a5 dimensional model was identified, with each dimension having its prototypes andanti- prototypes. Results showed that follower's IFTs differ from leader's follower'simplicit followership theories.