Josh v. Jeremy (Episode 8, Chapter 5)
By now, it is quite clear that the Huyopa tribe is dominated by two emergent leaders: Josh and Jeremy. Jeremy’s personal power has led his alliance to believe in his skills and knowledge whereas Josh has come up through the ranks with his charismatic power. That being said, I don’t think Josh appeared to be very likable in this episode. When he tried to use coercive power to regain an alliance with Baylor, it seemed that his hidden agenda was all that mattered. He tried to be an autocratic leader by telling Baylor that she “owed him” but, when he realized that she wasn’t going to obey his orders, he said he was “done with her”. From that point on, Josh was set on getting Baylor voted out.
According to the 5M model of Leadership Effectiveness, Josh is ineffective in the first task of modeling leadership for Baylor. The text says that a model leader works to “build a climate of mutual trust between the leader and group members”. Josh failed to do this with Baylor. Early on, Baylor had been a willing follower but, Josh voted for her at a Tribal Council and this brought about mistrust. Keeping in mind that Josh’s leadership was derived from personal power rather than position power, he would have done well to remember that his power came from an earned status. The text points out that “followers have a say about where they are being led” and, Baylor did not want to be led into an alliance where she couldn’t trust her leader.
On the other hand, Fiedler’s Contingency Model of Leadership Effectiveness can be used to identify Jeremy as a task-motivated leader. For now, this style is causing him to shine in his role as a leader. He is enjoying good leader-member relationships, there is a clear task and, he has a lot of power. With regard to leader-member relations, Jeremy’s alliance seems to have positive group members who are friendly towards one another and loyal to their leader. One reason for this may be that Jeremy treats his members with respect. Missy commented on this when she stated that “Jeremy and Jon are the only gentlemen.” While the other male tribe members paraded around with bad manners, Jeremy took care to maintain his level of personal power by not joining in with the poor behavior.
It follows however, that not all of the power in this game is personal. Jon and Jaclyn have been repeatedly looked upon as a “power couple” in this game but, this episode makes it clear that all of the power is perceived to be in Jon’s hands. Jon and Jaclyn use a democratic style to make decisions together but, Jon seems to have the positional power of being the man in the relationship. The effects of gender and leadership were quite evident as Jon went away to Exile Island and Jaclyn returned to camp with the others. None of the guys tried to talk to Jaclyn or strategize with her while her beau was away but, they all went running to Jon the moment he returned. Alec’s sentiments seemed rather clear when he boasted that Jaclyn was “gonna do whatever Jon says”. Maybe this week’s Tribal Council will teach Alec to show Jaclyn a little more respect, though; Jon followed Jaclyn’s wishes for this vote and voted against the guys.
Things don’t always go as expected on Survivor. Now that Josh is gone, it will be interesting to see if a new leader emerges in his place.
