Armstrong essay.

[Biohazard050]

Im getting my Armstrong essay out of the way (heh, i just got my Goddard last week     ) and want some opinions on my work.


C/CMSgt John Smith
Smallville Composite Squadron
USA-US-000

The difference between leadership and followership.


Leadership and followership are both important faucets of our world. Since the beginning of man, leaders have risen up to direct their followers to get things done, things like building the monuments of the world, forming the United States, and landing a man on the moon. All of which would have been impossible without leaders and followers.

The United States Air Force definition of Leadership is "Art of influencing and directing people in a way that will win their obedience, confidence, respect, and loyal cooperation in achieving a common objective" Leaders need to be on the "moral high ground'' so to speak, being free from prejudice, and being ethical in their actions. They need to be confident in themselves and be able to make decisions that affect other people. If a leader fails to meet these requirements, they lose the obedience, loyalty, and respect of their followers. In addition, leaders also need to recognize contributions made by individual followers as well as the group.

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines followership as "the capacity or willingness to follow a leader". This may seem simple, but scholar Robert Kelley goes on to describe the traits of good followers.

Self-Management: This refers to the ability to think critically, to be in control of one's actions, and work independently. It is important that followers manage themselves well as leaders are able to delegate tasks to these individuals.

Commitment: This refers to an individual being committed to the goal, vision, or cause of a group, team, or organization. This is an important quality of followers as it help keep one's (and other member's) morale and energy levels high.

Competence: It is essential that individuals possess the skills and aptitudes necessary to complete the goal or task or the group, team, or organization. Individuals high on this quality often hold skills higher than their average co-worker (or team member). Further, these individuals continue their pursuit of knowledge by upgrading their skills through classes and seminars.

Courage: Effective followers hold true to their beliefs and maintain and uphold ethical standards, even in the face of dishonest or corrupt superiors (leaders). These individuals are loyal, honest, and importantly, candid with their superiors.

I like to make this analogy when talking about leadership. Leadership is like a car, the leader is the driver, and the followers are the components of the car. The leader drives (leads) the car to his destination (goal). If he doesn't know how to drive, the car is useless, and conversely, if the components aren't working as a team, same result.  Leaders and followers are a dynamic relationship, if one is out of line, the other can't do it's/their job. Also, if leaders and followers don't communicate their issues to one another, the issues will not be resolved, resulting in a permanent gridlock.
"Don't find fault, find a remedy" Henry Ford.


So, how'd i do?

[coudano]

I think your word count was 476

Leadership and followership are both important faucets of our world. Since the beginning of man, leaders have risen up to direct their followers to get things done, things like building the monuments of the world, forming the United States, and landing a man on the moon. All of which would have been impossible without leaders and followers.

A faucet is a thing that water comes out of, into a sink.
A facet is an aspect of something.

Your second sentence is a run-on;  Your third sentence belongs as part of the second (after it is re-written and broken up).

You have stated a clear main idea 'leadership and followership are important facets of our world' however you haven't really provided any supporting evidence, or preview of your argument with the rest of this paragraph.

Your thesis (the assignment prompt) is not clearly stated in the introductory paragraph.

The United States Air Force definition of Leadership is "Art of influencing and directing people in a way that will win their obedience, confidence, respect, and loyal cooperation in achieving a common objectiveperiod" Leaders need to be on the "moral high ground'' [strike]so to speak[/strike], being free from prejudice, and being ethical in their actions. They need to be confident in themselves and be able to make decisions that affect other people. If a leader fails to meet these requirements, they lose the obedience, loyalty, and respect of their followers. In addition, leaders also need to recognize contributions made by individual followers as well as the group.(why?)

You seem to be defining what leadership is, here.
I can go with that, I guess.

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines followership as "the capacity or willingness to follow a leader". This may seem simple, but scholar Robert Kelley goes on to describe the traits of good followers.

Self-Management: This refers to the ability to think critically, to be in control of one's actions, and work independently. It is important that followers manage themselves well as leaders are able to delegate tasks to these individuals.

Commitment: This refers to an individual being committed to the goal, vision, or cause of a group, team, or organization. This is an important quality of followers as it help keep one's (and other member's) morale and energy levels high.

Competence: It is essential that individuals possess the skills and aptitudes necessary to complete the goal or task or the group, team, or organization. Individuals high on this quality often hold skills higher than their average co-worker (or team member). Further, these individuals continue their pursuit of knowledge by upgrading their skills through classes and seminars.

Courage: Effective followers hold true to their beliefs and maintain and uphold ethical standards, even in the face of dishonest or corrupt superiors (leaders). These individuals are loyal, honest, and importantly, candid with their superiors.

I think this is supposed to be a paragraph defining followership.
Except, it isn't a paragraph at all.  It needs a main idea, and then supporting sentences.

Are those your thoughts, or are you quoting Robert Kelly, wholesale?
Do you have a citation to include at the end of your essay from his works?

Personally i'd just drop the M-W definition, and say "R.K. defines followership as the four characteristics of 1, 2, 3, and 4.  1 means... 2 means... 3 means... 4 means...    (using your wording, not his, if that's not what you've already done).  That would make a fairly strong paragraph.

I like to make this analogy when talking about leadership. Leadership is like a car, the leader is the driver, and the followers are the components of the car. The leader drives (leads) the car to his destination (goal). If he doesn't know how to drive, the car is useless, and conversely, if the components aren't working as a team, same result.  Leaders and followers are a dynamic relationship, if one is out of line, the other can't do it's/their job. Also, if leaders and followers don't communicate their issues to one another, the issues will not be resolved, resulting in a permanent gridlock.
"Don't find fault, find a remedy" Henry Ford.

I think that you should avoid the conversational voice in this writing assignment.
Use it on the speech, that you give after your essay is done.



In this essay, you have defined what leadership is.  And you have defined what followership is.
However, you have not identified (as far as I can tell) one single DIFFERENCE between leadership and followership,
which is the actual assigned topic...


I'd go back and look at paragraph structure,

Main idea + 3 or more sentences that directly support the main idea + a transition to the next paragraph.


Try filling out an outline with general ideas, then transferring them into sentences and paragraphs

INTRO MAIN IDEA:  Essay thesis, assigned prompt, clearly stated
supporting 1:  preview of argument
supporting 2:  preview of argument
supporting 3:  preview of argument

DIFF b/w L&F #1 (main idea): 
s1:
s2:
s3:

DIFF b/w L&F #2 (main idea):
s1:
s2:
s3:

DIFF b/w L&F #3 (main idea):
s1:
s2:
s3:

CONCLUSION:  Restate thesis
emphasize most important point
make a final point or witty quote

[capgirl]

I am going to point out some grammar and readability errors, and let the others critique the actual message.

Leadership and followership are both important faucets of our world.

Coudano already corrected "faucets" and "facets".

Since the beginning of man, leaders have risen up to direct their followers to get things done, things like building the monuments of the world, forming the United States, and landing a man on the moon. All of which would have been impossible without leaders and followers.

That section is a run-on and an awkward sentence. You can simply correct it by adding a semicolon ; between "get things done" and "things like building". Or you could reword it something like this (in red are my changes):

Since the beginning of man, leaders have risen up to direct their followers to get things done; things like building the monuments of the world, forming the United States, and landing a man on the moon. All of this would have been impossible without leaders and followers.

The United States Air Force definition of Leadership is "Art of influencing and directing people in a way that will win their obedience, confidence, respect, and loyal cooperation in achieving a common objective"

You need to put an apostrophe "s" after United States Air Force (Force's) since it is being used in the possessive case. Leadership does not need to be capitalized because it is not at the beginning of the sentence. Also, you might want to include "the" at the beginning of the definition. You also need a period outside the quotation marks.

Leaders need to be on the moral "high ground'' so to speak, being free from prejudice, and being ethical in their actions.

There should be a comma after "moral high ground" outside the quotation marks. Also, as this is a run-on, you would need to either word it differently or remove the comma and add a semicolon between "so to speak" and "being free from prejudice".

This may seem simple, but scholar Robert Kelley goes on to describe the traits of good followers.

Self-Management: This refers to the ability to think critically, to be in control of one's actions, and work independently. It is important that followers manage themselves well as leaders are able to delegate tasks to these individuals.

Commitment: This refers to an individual being committed to the goal, vision, or cause of a group, team, or organization. This is an important quality of followers as it help keep one's (and other member's) morale and energy levels high.

Competence: It is essential that individuals possess the skills and aptitudes necessary to complete the goal or task or the group, team, or organization. Individuals high on this quality often hold skills higher than their average co-worker (or team member). Further, these individuals continue their pursuit of knowledge by upgrading their skills through classes and seminars.

Courage: Effective followers hold true to their beliefs and maintain and uphold ethical standards, even in the face of dishonest or corrupt superiors (leaders). These individuals are loyal, honest, and importantly, candid with their superiors.

I am unsure if this is the exact format that Robert Kelley wrote this in, or if you have added your own thoughts. Could you explain that so I can help you more? If these are all Robert Kelley's words, then it should be put in quotation marks.

Leaders and followers are a dynamic relationship, if one is out of line, the other can't do it's/their job.

You might want to correct the sentence to something similar to "Leaders and followers create a dynamic relationship, so if one is out of line, the other cannot do his job." Because "other" is singular, there is no need for "it's/their". It is more pleasing to change it to "his" (and there is no need to say his/her in this case).

"Don't find fault, find a remedy" Henry Ford.

There should be a period in the quotation marks and a dash between the quote and "Henry Ford". Or it could be reworded something like this.

To quote Henry Ford: "Don't find fault; find a remedy."

These are just meant to be suggestions. Congratulations on your Goddard.

[Dougie D.]

Regardless of any opinions posted, I think you would be most satisfied as long as you make sure that the final product is something that you like, and that it properly conveys your opinion. I do like your car analogy; more leaders should adopt this mentality.