The evolutionary perspective given by Von Rueeden and Van Vugt brought up many new ideas for me in terms of leadership and followership in the SSS and LSS scopes. Their ideas on how sometimes the evolutionary changes of leadership and followers are mismatched in modern contexts was a new concept for me. They touch on dominance and the impact the dominant trait has on today’s decisions made my followers. There is a fine line between leadership and dominance, it is something many are wary of. The authors explain that there has been a sensitivity formed to exploitation throughout time and that followers are very wary of exploitation today by would-be dominant leaders. Hence, it is crucial to emphasize integrity and fairness as a leader, to avoid that sensitivity spike by followers.
Many of the topics the paper discusses are pretty much unalterable, race, gender, height, etc. But this sensitivity and personality trait idea is malleable in the hands of leaders. People running for positions in the LSS context know what is important to followers. There are specialists made to design the disposition of leaders to the public, it is has become “I appear to be sensitive,” (switch out whatever personality trait you want in place of ‘sensitive’). This is through adds, donations, press releases, speeches, etc. My point is that in that LLS context, someone can easily appear a certain way. That is why women wear heels, to appear taller. This is one of the flaws in the LLS context, the leader is so far away, followers see what is made for them to see. While in the SSS context, leaders are in that collaborative state and must be seen.
I think that the point you bring up with sensitivity is interesting when you consider the appearance of anger in the political processes. In some ways, anger from the candidate can be used to excite the voters if they too are angry about the same topics. A lot this can be seen with the way the Trump campaign in 2016 ran. However, there is a fine line that the candidate must find to not drive away potential voters and I think that that is where the concept of sensitivity comes into play.
I agree with you that there is a fine line between leadership and dominance and i think that is honestly what a lot of people overlook. One can be dominant in a room and not necessarily be the leader in it and I think the reluctance within smaller groups to this type of individual is valuable to avoid exploitation.
I agree with Eyga, dominance and leadership require a sense of balance. Like most things to much of one or the other can be negative and overpowering.
I also touched upon the unalterable vs changeable characteristics and qualities in my response. One of my questions is, if in our modern world we are able to realize that in order to succeed in leadership in LSSs you need to be demeaning and narcissistic, then could we potentially attempt to alter this going forward?