8 / 31
6
unlike most other leadership relationships because TED is equally dependent on the follower as the follower
is on TED. TED’s followers are creating the construct of leadership for the leader, and TED the leader is
creating the role of follower for the speakers, the audiences, and the viewers.
Wilfred Drath in his article “Leadership Principles and Leadership Tasks” and Keith Grint in his article,
“Problems, Problems, Problems: the Social Construction of Leadership,” both examine how the social
construct of leadership is not a label created by the leader, but instead a recognition by the followers that
yes, what is occurring is a type of leadership (Drath, Grint). And since the followers create the construct of
leadership for TED, TED can be the servant and transformational leader for the followers. The followers in
this case are not regular followers. In Robert Kelly’s article, “In Praise of Followers,” he writes that there is a
difference between effective and ineffective followers (195). For TED’s followers, the followers are effective
followers because they are enthusiastic, intelligent, and have a self-reliant participation to TED (Kelly 195).
Kelly stresses the importance of how the behavior of the follower is a large determinant in whether the
followers are effective or not. The best example of TED’s followers being effective is the reaction of the TED
followers in the 2010 TEDxCharlotte conference.
In her article, “When TED Lost Control of its Crowd,” published in the Harvard Business Review, Nilofer
Merchant a business woman, professor, and author, examines how at the TEDxCharlotte conference in 2010,
helped to shape TED into the leader it is currently, the effectiveness of the followers, and the assurance of
TED’s leadership in the future. At the TEDx conference, speaker Randy Powell, a self-taught mathematician,
gave a talk that at the time was received with praise and applause. But two years later, his talk on Vortex-
Based Mathematics was found by a group of influential scientist to be completely fake and not supported by
any real science or evidence (Merchant).
While this incident was a hit to the reputation and strength of TED, the response TED had to Powell
and the TED community is what proved to the world that TED is not only a servant and transformational
leader, but a leader that is guided by innovation and change. In the aftermath of the Powell scandal, the
TED community was in a stage of question as to the validity of TEDx content, and TED followers began to
question and doubt the ideas behind TED (Merchant). In response to the doubt and distrust that had arisen
within their followers, TED addressed the problem head on. For the problem was not just false content,
the problem involved the brand and name TED had built, morphing into something that TED could not
control. The empire that TED had built through TEDx had become too large and out of control and as a
result strayed from the original vision TED had created.
When an authoritative leaders followers are not following the vision, they can be a parasite and infect the
mentality of the leader/follower relationship. How TED resolved this infecting parasite was through
“listening loudly,” a term coined by Merchant. Merchant defines listening loudly as the act of “engaging in a
dialogue through a variety of public forums to understand what had gone wrong and to learn how to fix it,”
and that is what TED did (Merchant).
Through the use of public forums and posted exchanges with NPR, CNN, Buzzfeed, Huffington Post,
and other venues, TED was reaching different communities, communicating publicly and person-to-person,
and most importantly moving forward. TED achieved not only closure to the incident, they achieved
a consensus with their followers that they were paying attention to the concerns and problems of the
followers. TED learned about the systemic problem of a lack of shared purpose that existed within their
community that demanded a broad solution (Merchant). TED showed the world that they were listening
loudly when they redirected the crowd and vision of TED through a reinforcement of the shared purpose of
TED.
The trial that TED went through with Powell is similar to the reputation scandal that Salmon Inc.
experienced. Both compare in the fault that can arise when the capacity of the leader become too little and
the people too big, and both TED and Salmon Inc. in the aftermath of the problem react in similar ways.
Although Salmon Inc. initially faces a negative impact, the insertion of Warren Buffet provided the saving
grace for Salmon Inc. Through Buffet, Salmon Inc. was once again able to reinstall within their company a
culture of accountability and the understanding of the preferred behavior (Unseem 200).
Whereas Salmon Inc. used Buffet as their solution, TED used a public letter that reminded the TED
community that the organization’s mission was theirs to uphold (Merchant). The letter also created
a commitment for TED and the community that “spreading important ideas was the shared purpose,
improving quality was a shared problem, and it would take a shared effort to fix it” (Merchant). This was a
pivotal move for TED because it showed the followers that TED was at times a faulty leader, but that it could
reestablish the trust through increased transparency within the community (Merchant). TED was taking a
potential problem that could lead to its demise and instead created a collective teaching opportunity. TED’s
saving grace comes from their followers who held TED accountable, and by listening loudly, TED was able to
recreate a new company culture that is understood by all from speakers to TEDx organizers.
The incident of TEDxCharlotte is a testament to the realization that a leader is not necessarily born but
can