They Don’t Follow You. They Follow the Mission.
I walked into the room excited. I walked out frustrated.
I had this plan, a new tech stack, a better workflow, and a solid migration path. It made total sense: cleaner architecture, faster builds, and a long-term payoff. So, I walked into that room like a leader, ready to rally the team.
I barely got through my first three slides before I saw it.
That moment, when your team's eyes go from curious to cold, it hits you in the gut. You realize: They’re not with me on this. And for a second, you feel betrayed. Don’t they trust me? Don’t they get it?
But here’s the truth I had to learn the hard way: They’re not supposed to follow you. They’re supposed to follow the mission. And that mission had better offer something valuable, or no one will get on board.
Resistance Always Comes First
The moment you try to steer the ship in a new direction, resistance shows up. It’s not personal. It’s not even conscious. It’s biology. Your brain is designed to protect you from the unknown. And for developers, the unknown often means:
That’s real. We love to pretend devs are rational, logical creatures. However, when you announce a change, especially a technical one, you’re not challenging logic. You’re challenging identity.
👉 That’s why the “why” matters more than the “how.”
You can build the most efficient stack on earth and still lose your team because you didn’t show them what’s in it for them.
The Inner Battle: Resistance vs. Creative Power
Every employee, hell, every human, is at war between two forces:
But resistance always comes first. It shows up loud. Confident. Logical. It’ll say things like:
“We’ve already invested too much in this stack.”
And you’ll hear it, not just in others, but in your own damn head.
Assistance? That voice is quieter. It’s not as persuasive at first. You need to create space for it. In yourself. In your team.
And you can’t do that with Scrum or Agile or some bullshit framework checklist. You do it by telling a real story that makes the leap worth it.
Leadership Isn’t About You
Most tech leads mess up at this point, and I did, too. We think leadership is about us: our plan, our clarity, our conviction.
But no one follows you because you’re confident. They follow you because they believe you’ll take them somewhere better. Leadership is about being the promise of progress and then delivering on it, again and again.
You need to design the journey in a way that each person sees value for themselves.
Not fake value. Not "It’ll be better for the company." Real value they can feel in their day-to-day life.
Less pain in the codebase
More pride in the product
A tech stack they can grow with, not fight against
Build a Culture That Knows the Game
Once you do this a few times, something shifts. Your team starts to see the pattern:
Change === Resistance
And that’s when you become effective, in the best possible way. Now that you have a team that trusts you. Not just because they like you. But because you’ve led them through fear into something better.
That’s not "nice leadership."
That’s authentic leadership.
Here's the Deal
If you want to lead, really lead, you have to stop making it about you.
You’re not the product.
The mission is the product.
Make it exciting. Make it worth it.
And your people will walk through fire with you. But try to push change without meaning, try to lead without value, and you’ll end up back where I started, standing in a quiet room, wondering why no one’s following.
—Adrian
By the way, since you've come this far in the article, you're likely an aspiring person 🍀. I am teaching to become a better software engineer and a leader worth following.
You can find me on MentorCruise.com