Leadership and Management

Management and Leadership

Management 330

February 13, 2006

Abstract

Leadership and management are certainly two different traits however one person can have both qualities. In order to create a healthy organization, the manager/leader has several options at his or her disposal that will foster strong follower and trusting subordinates.

Management and Leadership

Perhaps the simplest way to differentiate between management and leadership is to say that managers have subordinates and leaders have followers. In most cases the manager is a subordinate as well. The difference there is that followers often seek out a leader and want to believe and subordinates have no choice but to follow the orders of a person of authority. There are definite qualities that distinguish between management and leadership however as we dig deeper into this subject and learn more about particular examples we will see that there are those who exhibit both.

A leader has the ability or need to foment change by leading people and encouraging them to follow him and work toward his vision. A manager has objectives and will try to create stability by managing the work of her subordinates. Managers also plan detail and have power through positional authority while leaders simply set a direction and have power through personal charisma. A leader will appeal to the heart of her followers while a manager is more practical and appeals to the practical side or the brain of his subordinates. In many cases a leader creates energy in the organization through his passion for the job at hand. The manager may derive energy through control. The ability to change is evident in both positions however the dynamic is such that the leader is more proactive and the manager is reactive. Quite often the leaders persuasive strategy will be to try to sell his theory on what needs to be done while the manager simply tells her subordinates what has to be done. Another difference is that very often what the leader gets out of the job is excitement while the manager is merely collecting a paycheck. A leader is prone to taking risks and breaking rules while a manager tries to minimize risk and follow rules; very often rules that she has made. One way the leader will try to provoke change is by creating conflict and taking the organization down new roads and in an entirely new direction. A manager tries to avoid conflict and stay on course and does not take the road less traveled. Finally a good leader will take the blame when the plan does not come to fruition while there are many managers that will seek to blame others when objectives are not met.

A successful leader does not necessarily need to have earth-shattering ideas. A good example (Bateman & Snell, 2004) is Phil Turner. As the facilities manager at Raychem Corporation, Turner efficiently managed a group of workers whose responsibility it was to repair everything in the building from cubicles to toilets to air-conditioning. Turner wanted his employees to see their job as more of a mission and not just another job. His vision was to make them feel as though they were an integral part of the organization and be major contributors. Turner’s desire was “to lift people’s spirits through beauty, cleanliness, and functionality, enthusiasm, good cheer, and excellence.” Although it was not his responsibility to foster a healthy organizational culture, he felt it was important to the success of the company. I have visited many different companies over the years and found that the ones where management has taken a genuine interest in making the actual work environment a place where people enjoy spending a third of their day to be the most successful organizations