Exploring E-leadership: the Follower's Experience

Abstract: First and foremost, e-leadership is leadership virtually performed. The aim with this master thesis is to analyze how e-leadership is experienced by the followers. The study is qualitative with focus on interviews to test the theoretical concepts existing already. First, the findings from the review of academic literature in the field is summarized in a theoretical framework, which explains how the leader and the followers relate to each other. According to the findings, the leader-follower relationship in a virtual context is based on trust and communication. Concluded from interviews with four leaders and eight followers, four vital practical aspects were discovered with regards to communication and trust in the leader-follower relationship. The topics are: 1) self-sufficiency, 2) structure, planning and accessibility, 3) virtual meetings, and 4) personal relations. Self-sufficiency refers to the importance of individual responsibility, whilst structure, planning and accessibility considers the need of being prepared and organized when spontaneous contact is rare and difficult. Further, virtual meetings refer to how the virtual teams meet and the importance of keeping those meetings efficient. Lastly, the barriers for developing personal relationships are experienced to influence the work of the virtual team. These topics were frequently referred to in the interviews with the followers, hence concluded crucial aspects to consider for an e-leader. Even though this research has some limitations, one of them being the narrow scope of respondents (mostly women in tech companies), the results provide topics for future research as well as broadening the concepts of leadership, followership and teams in a virtual context.