This book is an excellent source for anyone who wants to build their leadership skills. Each skill has its own chapter and includes advice on interacting with others in an organization, examples of professionalism in the workplace and how to communicate positively with others instead of participating in office gossip. This book breaks down and explains the many aspects of leadership.

Anytime you enter an organization of any kind from a high school club to a professional business, there's leadership involved. As we grow up, we experience varying types of leadership. The question is, is your leadership effective for the team of individuals in the group?

The book written by George Vucin called LEADERSHIP: As Seen Through the Eyes of a Follower is full of various types of leadership from the view of the subordinate, the follower. He goes through the importance of followers trusting the leader, feedback, respect, barriers as a leader, ethics, and corruption.
Personally, I felt like the book was very long, extremely detailed, and full of stories from various organization types. I could see my own experiences in most of these variables. Sometimes when we work for a large organization, we can experience several leadership styles in that one environment because of so many individuals involved.
LEADERSHIP: As Seen Through the Eyes of the Follower by George Vucin was provided complimentary for an honest review. I give this book 3-stars because it is extremely long and drawn out. I found it difficult to read, yet it contains great information.

A good leadership book, with many excellent examples, but it strayed from the 'through the eyes of the follower' theme too often to live up to its title.

George Vucin's "Leadership" is a basic guide covering a myriad of topics that leaders need to master. The book seemed to be geared towards leaders in the workplace with many examples and explanations focused on leaders in the business world. For someone who is just entering a lower-level managerial position or the world of leadership and management in general, perhaps that person would benefit. When I first saw it, I was excited by the premise of the book; it promised a view of leadership from a new angle. I had hoped to read about new ideas -- or at least ideas packaged in a new, interesting way. Unfortunately, my expectations were not met. As someone who had been in a position of leadership for many years and read other books of leadership, I found the ideas to be simple and basic. I would tentatively recommend this book for those who are less knowledgeable about the world of management -- I think that the thorough writing style and plethora of examples will help you consider all the issues that you will face in leadership positions. Leadership is a complex task for you not only need to master certain skills and abilities personally but also need to adapt yourself to your situation/environment and to the needs of those who are following you. Those parameters are dynamic, which increases the difficult level. The goal of this book is to help you understand what those parameters are.

Thank you to Dog Ear Publishing and NetGalley for a copy of this book for review. The opinions above are my own.

L. David Marquet wrote a great book that had the subtitle "A True Story of Turning Followers Into Leaders". I suppose Vucin might have been trying to turn leaders into followers with his book. Okay, not really per se...but his point of making leaders aware of the eyes of followers is one lost on quite a few in leadership positions.

I thought the narrative was simple, no new revelations...just repackaged, but that's probably because as I was an enlisted Navy sailor who later became a Navy officer and I am keenly aware of how I comport myself with those I am charged to lead. I've mentored people who have risen through the ranks in the military and civilian life, I've made it an explicit point to tell them "Never forget where you came from." (I've even turned that on leaders several ranks above me: "Sir, don't you remember how much you hated last minute data calls when you were at our level?") Just as situations call for different leadership styles and good leaders adjust (too many in leadership positions are not good leaders and the adage of "To those who only know how to use a hammer, everything looks like a nail." is too appropriate), an intelligent leader recognizes the perspectives of the different...<i>followers</i>...and adjusts.

Not everyone who is led is a "follower". Some follow because they are happy that way, and some follow because of positional authority. Those are the ones to be aware of, and to whom Vucin seems to be pointing the reader leaders. I suggest lots of reading, watching, digesting to add to your leader toolbox. This is one book of many.

I downloaded this when I had three ARCs to finish and didn't start it until late in the lease. Unfortunately for me (and the author), I had a few things come up after finishing and before I could write up my review, my DRM lease expired and my notes disappeared with it as I no longer had access on my chosen reader. I did recall one observation on the book composition/format: I prefer notes and references, particularly in books such as these. They usually serve as jumping off points, although I sometimes pull threads to follow up on a point linked to a reference to confirm. None in this book.

Leadership books abound in this culture. This book sets itself apart from the others in that the author takes into account the various types of followers a leader might encounter and how to change and adapt one’s leadership style in order to meet the needs of the followers. What a refreshing concept in a business book!

I’m an educator, and for years we’ve been told “If a child can’t learn the way we teach, maybe we should teach the way they learn.” (Attributed to Ignacio Estrada, I think.) The author of this book takes this concept into any leadership position. If one’s followers aren’t following, then maybe one should lead the way the followers need to be led.

This book covers the standard concepts of different perspectives, leadership roles, trust, authority, feedback, respect, character, environment, morale, organizational standards and values, reward and punishment, follower motivations, politics, personality attributes, virtual leadership, unions, teams, leadership barriers, perception of ethics and fairness, unofficial channels of communication, sources of corruption, importance of flexibility, and good and bad leadership practices. But each concept is covered from the viewpoint of how the leader’s various actions may impact the followers’ abilities to follow. One of the greatest truths of the book (I feel) was found in the chapter on Final Thoughts. In it, the author notes that sometimes in the book, it may be difficult to distinguish whose behavior is being addressed or for whom the section was written. The author notes that unless one is a “supreme leader,” then we all are followers on some level. The example he gives is that even a sole proprietor must take into account the customers’ wants and needs, thus making the sole proprietor a follower of sorts.

This isn’t an overly long book (185 pages), but it is packed with wisdom and insights that necessitate slowing down somewhat and digesting what one reads. It’s a smorgasbord worth lingering over.

I gratefully received this book as an eARC from the author, publisher and NetGalley in exchange for my unbiased review.

Leadership books can be a little tricky to write. Most all of them I have read tell you how to be a leader, and that is OK. But to have a leader, you have to have a group of followers. That is where this book differs from most other leadership books. The follower is not ignored. In fact, you are taught that what you do as a leader can affect your followers.

To often a leader wants to stay with the style that got them where they are. The reason for that is simple. It worked before so it must work now, and no one likes to change. The thing is, as you move up the ladder, the people that report to you change, and you have to know how to change with them.

Leadership principles are discussed. In that way this book is no different than any other leadership book. What is different than most is that once they are taught, then the view of the different types of followers are talked about. What works for one type of follower will not work for another. And they type of people change with what you do.

An example of my own life shows a major point of this book. I work retail on weekends, I have for almost 10 years. Started out in the back room unloading the truck each day I worked. This store rotated managers around about every 6 months. We worked well with one type of manager, but rather than send us that type, the ones that would roll up their sleeves and work with, we often got the ones that would come in, say do the work and then move on. Now I work on the sales floor and that is the way the management works. If you had a manger doing the work with you, then it would be looked at as he did not think you could do the work yourself.

This is the core I got out of this book. Be the manager the people who follow you need you to be. I have been involved with volunteer leadership with churches I have attended for years now. This is the book that I wish I had years ago. What worked in one place did not work in others. I had to learn to change.

I recommend this book for anyone looking at being a leader of any sort. It is excellent in teaching what one needs to know.

This is a very perceptive and unusual approach to the business of leadership. Any readers who have 'been there' will relate to the situations which are so sensitively described. It is a clever idea to approach leadership through the eyes of those that are led rather than a third party observer as is often the case in books on this subject. It should be a must for leaders to encourage them to see themselves through the eyes of the led and a good read for those mystified by the behaviour of their current leaders. The book would be an excellent basis for talks on the subject.

It takes creativity these days to come up with a new view on leadership. What differentiates Leadership: As Seen Through the Eyes of a Follower is the perspective. Don't think it's now about looking up to a leader and obeying whatever he or she commands you to do. George Vucin considers everyone as a follower of a leader at all times as well. It is as if Bob Dylan's Gotta Serve Somebody is playing in the background.

Straightforward themes like vision, motivation, acknowledgment, and recognition are addressed next to the roles of the leader and the required flexibility in leadership styles. The author chose not to elaborate all the theoretical models and popular frameworks around. In fact, no references or footnotes at all appear in Leadership, although Vucin confirms to have read libraries full in the five years that took to write this debut.

Rather than separating managers from leaders, Vucin talks about managers and social figurehead both needed, sometimes combined in one person, at other times more prevalent traits of different persons. A manager cannot perform well without social skills, and social figurehead will need their managerial skills to lead the way properly. Trust, office politics, leading virtual teams, ethics, and sources of corruption offer more content in this book than just an introduction to leadership. Well done!

Well written. Organized. Not much new information but good nonetheless.