Hello,
I was wondering, if is there any way to tell an NPC what EXACTLY to do?
I see, that to change their leveling scheme, you'll need an unofficial patch, but is it possible to, for example tell someone to pick a lock, or such?
If not, why are there skills as lockpicking, or persuasion keep increasing at some characters?

If you attempt to pick a lock and one of your party is better at it than you they will say "I'll do that for you" and take over if you give them a bit of time. Other skills are less useful really. I've almost never attempted to rely on follower skills.

I'm not sure if it helps any, but you can order your followers to move to your cursor location, attack, or stand ground (etc.) by using the first couple of F-keys.