Leadership vs. Management
First and foremost, let’s try to define the terms leadership vs management. To do so let’s start by looking at definitions of what each of them actually means.
Leadership
My definition of leadership would be:
“Leadership is the ability to lead and the capacity to have a vision for the future. As well as the necessary skills to communicate and convince others of the relevance of the vision and the direction that needs to be taken in order to move closer to it.”
In my definition of leadership, you can see that having a vision of how things need to be in the future and convincing others of the same is central.
Management
Now let’s take a look at my definition of management:
“Management is the ability to efficiently translate ideas and vision into action, together with the individuals and teams which the manager in question is in charge of.”
Clearly what is important here is the ability to be efficient and translate ideas into action as well as having the necessary authority to do so.
In order to further “set the scene” for our discussion let’s now take someone else’s words into account. There is a phrase often attributed to Peter Drucker which serves our purpose very well indeed:
“Management is about doing things right. Leadership is about doing the right things.”
The above quotation gives a clear indication that management is more to do with efficiency. Whereas leadership would apparently be more to do with effectiveness. So, one of the first questions we might naturally pose ourselves when looking at management vs. leadership is, how can we determine what is efficient behaviour compared to effective behaviour?
One of the most obvious things to say here is that leadership would seem to be more to do with choosing the direction to take. As opposed to management which is more action and task-focused. Even more obvious is the fact that leaders have a real choice as they are concerned with vision. Whereas a manager would be more concerned with execution.
If we go back to our first definitions, leaders had to convince others of the direction to take. It would seem quite natural then that leaders would have a tendency to be more people-focused than their management or their managerial counterparts. On the contrary, it would seem that managers need to be more task-focused. This is to ensure that the leader’s vision becomes a reality through the actions taken by themselves and the people in their teams.
Strategic Planning in Leadership vs Management
What we’ve just said aligns well with what is often called strategic planning. A basic outline for strategic planning gives us something along the following lines in terms of the order in which things need to happen:
- Vision
- Mission
- Analysis
- Goals
- Objectives
- Action plan
- Budget
- Follow up and feedback
Naturally, if we follow the logic of what has already been said, the overall vision for an organisation and the mission statement would be areas where leadership and leaders should definitely be involved. This is due to the fact that the mission statement evolves directly from the overall vision. It gives more detail about what needs to be done. Also, it shows how the vision translates into certain directions to be taken in order to ensure positive outcomes, or more importantly, what Michael Porter described as a competitive advantage.
Results & Conclusions
When it comes to analysis this is true in the domain of both managers and leaders. This is due to the fact that the results and conclusions of the results have to be agreed upon before things are taken any further. Most of the time it would be for managers to carry out the SWOT or PESTEL analysis with their teams before presenting them to leadership. They need to agree on where the priorities lie for the organisation. This is in terms of looking at both internal strengths and weaknesses and comparing them to the external environment. In particular, they need to look compared to what the direct competition is doing.
This then allows us to establish goals and objectives for the organisation based upon the agreed-upon mission statement and priorities. This then firmly becomes the domain of management, as does the rest of the above list. Why do I say this? Well, this also has to do with other leadership traits. These are to do with leadership’s ability to delegate and empower. This is critical when discussing management versus leadership.
Top leadership need to have confidence in their ability to have chosen the right people to run the organisation on a day-to-day basis. If they do not have this ability they risk falling into the “deadly” trap of micromanagement. This is where they are too involved with the day-to-day running of the company. They need to therefore trust their managers to be able to translate the vision and mission into goals, objectives and actions. This does not mean that managers have a completely “free hand.”
Top Management
As we can see from the strategic planning list there are still stages of budgeting follow-up and feedback to be allowed for. In other words, there will be control through reporting to top management (what we are calling leadership for the moment). This control is about whether or not the wider goals and more specific objectives of the company are being met. As well as whether or not the budget is being respected.
Leaders trust and empower their managers to run a company. But this does not preclude control at certain points in time. Indeed, a necessary part of delegation is letting people know exactly where the “limits” of their authority or decision-making power stop.
For the moment we have been treating management and leadership as two separate entities in an organisation where information and strategy cascade throughout the organisation in a vertical manner.
What we have talked about so far can best be summed quite nicely by the below. A favourite Japanese proverb of mine (often attributed to the founder of the Honda Motor Company):
“Vision without action is a daydream. Action without vision is a nightmare.”
This phrase is both important and a great warning for people in both leadership and management roles and positions. Obviously, if vision is never translated into action or executed in any way then the company or organisation will be at a standstill. On the other hand, if we are constantly taking action without knowing where we are supposed to be going this is likely to lead to some quite disastrous consequences.
Taking vision without action does not make for an effective leader. It will always lead to a lack of competitive advantage and the failure of the company.
So, in conclusion, leadership and management need to function together. They need to be completely aligned if the organisation is to be successful.
Separate Entities
In this discussion, till present, we have discussed leadership and management as separate entities with predefined tasks and prerogatives completely separate from one another. In other words, we have been discussing how people are positioned within an organisation. However, if we ask ourselves the question of whether or not the same people can assume both management and leadership roles, the answer would be a resounding yes, of course, they can.
Before going any further let’s clarify something. We are not discussing the differences between a boss and a leader here but between a manager and a leader. The word “boss” often has a negative connotation to it as we can see from the well-known quote of Simon Sinek:
“A boss has the title, a leader has the people.”
A “boss” often brings to mind negative associations. This can include; using people, taking credit for their achievements, inspiring fear, and not sharing knowledge. Also, a boss may be accused of depending on authority and using the word “I” all the time and never “we”. A good manager or leader does not do these things but is exactly the opposite in every case.
If we go back to our earlier discussions and definitions, one of the main differences between the roles of a manager and a leader was that managers have a tendency to be task focused. Whereas leaders tend to be more people-focused. However, this by no means makes the two mutually exclusive. Indeed, inasmuch as situational leadership and management models exist, so does the ability for someone to be more or less people or to be more or less task focused at any one point in time.
People Focused
As in the models just mentioned there will be contexts within which being highly directive will be necessary. We might expect this from a top-down manager. We are not, after all, going to hold a participative brainstorming meeting to decide whether or not we should evacuate the building in the case of a fire.
Other situations will of course require you to be much more focused on one person at one time. These situations may include a one-to-one meeting or an end-of-year evaluation. My belief is that in order to be successful you need to be both a manager and a leader. You need to be capable of being more or less people-focused. This is dependent on the person you are dealing with, the situation and the context.
The Superior Manager
To take this a little further a leader (often seen as superior to a manager) needs to be able to manage a certain number of tasks which absolutely cannot be led! They for example are able to manage themselves. They also need to be able to manage their most important commodity, time. And they need to manage this in the service of their most important asset, their people.
A leader who cannot control their temper will not be able to maintain the support of the rank and file. They will have to depend on tactics based on fear (like a boss). In this process, they will create a highly toxic working environment and everything that goes with it. Often this includes; poor retention, high turnover, high absence rate, payroll cost exploding, and productivity decreasing.
As we have just seen, self-discipline and managing oneself are critical to the exemplarity. This is rightly expected and deserved by the people in the workforce at all levels.
Similarly, a leader who cannot manage the very important task of properly managing their time will also be in serious difficulty very quickly. We’ve all heard the expression “planning to fail is failing to plan.” Well, let me tell you this is no joke! A leader who cannot manage his or her time will constantly be causing themselves and others unnecessary stress.
Leadership vs Management
Imagine that as a leader you cannot distinguish the difference between what is urgent and important. Imagine that you are constantly dealing with things which are both unimportant and not urgent. In these circumstances, your company or organisation will definitely be going “nowhere fast.” Your agenda really does need to be managed. If possible, by using a tool such as the Eisenhower matrix. This will mean that you can act, plan, delegate or ignore tasks and situations as appropriate.
On the same theme, a manager must know when to be more focused on people and have the necessary skills to be able to do this to optimum effect. Here, of course, we are not talking about technical or time management skills but more about soft skills such as attentive or active listening, NVC (non-violent communication), demonstrating empathy or knowing how to use neuro-linguistic programming techniques.
Technical vs Soft Skills
Being people-focused and mastering the aforementioned soft skills is what will make the difference between being a good manager and leader or a great one. In addition, technical skills can be easily trained. But soft skills are usually on the contrary a matter of education and experience (and therefore more difficult to master).
I think the point made here was best said by Andy Stanley, and I quote:
“Leaders who don’t listen will eventually be surrounded by people who have nothing to say.”
Conclusion of Leadership vs Management
In conclusion, I hope that it comes as no surprise when I say to you that there is no such thing as manager vs. leader. In today’s organisations, we need both. Both an organisational point of view (positioning) and a role-playing point of view (depending on context).
Sometimes even if we have assembled a magnificent strategy, we are doomed to fail. This may be because no one in the organisation is capable of translating the strategy into action or planning and executing goals and objectives.
In other words, in order to win we need to be effective as leaders and efficient as managers.
