Management and leadership practises were once just a subject for TV sitcoms – the Office's David Brent, a master of 'management speak', was celebrated as an example of all that is bad about bosses.
But recent scandals, such as those concerning the BBC, NHS and the banking sector, have forced the debate about management and leadership up the agenda. Employers and politicians alike are now asking how our public and private bodies should be organised – and how we can prepare the next generation of leaders.
Key to the problem is understanding the difference between management and leadership, says John Kotter, Konosuke Matsushita professor of leadership at Harvard University. He fears that too often, employers use the terms synonymously.
'Management is a set of processes that keep an organisation functioning. They make it work today – they make it hit this quarter's numbers. The processes are about planning, budgeting, staffing, clarifying jobs, measuring performance, and problem-solving when results did not go to plan.'
Leadership is very different. 'It is about aligning people to the vision, that means buy-in and communication, motivation and inspiration.'
Churchill is a great example of a leader, but he is not manager. 'He is not beloved because he made the bureaucracy function.'
If an organisation is run effectively, leadership and management will exist in tandem, adds Jonathan Gosling, professor of leadership studies at the University of Exeter Business School. He points to the management technique known as target-setting – a concept that will only work when good leadership is present.
'Target setting is a management technique used to focus attention on certain activities. A hospital, for example, might set targets around waiting times.'
For this exercise to work, someone within the hospital must show leadership by emphasising the importance of the activity. 'In this example, the wider purpose is helping patients to lead better lives. A leader needs to inspire employees by showing how meeting a target can contribute towards this aim. They also need to think of new ways of reaching that target.'
How an organisation strikes a balance between management and leadership depends on the environment in which it operates. 'If the world is not changing and you are on top, then management is essential but more leadership really is not,' says Kotter. 'Leadership is always about change: it's not about mobilising people to do what they've always done well to continue to do it well.'
But at a time of economic crisis and technological transformation, leadership has never been more essential, according to Dame Mary Marsh founding director of the Clore Social Leadership Programme and former chief executive of the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC). She emphasises that employees should be encouraged to develop the necessary qualities as soon as possible.
'It's crazy to think that you only need to lead when you're working at the top of an organisation – you simply can't learn it all then because you'll be too busy doing it.'
While management and leadership are distinct concepts, there is a natural overlap between the skills they require, argues Marsh.
'There will be senior leaders who are particularly focused on strategic aims, but it's a great mistake to think that if you're managing a team you're only managing it. You're actually leading as well.'
Mentoring and formal training can help employees make the most of opportunities to use leadership skills, according to research by the Chartered Management Institute. It reports that 90% of members who have completed a management and leadership qualification found the experience improved their performance at work. There was also a 'ripple effect', with 81% of those surveyed passing on their knowledge to colleagues.
Academics say that training demystifies the idea of leadership. They fear the media's representations of popular 'hero leaders', such as Steve Jobs or Churchill, have caused some to believe that only a select few are born with the ability to work in a top-level position.
'At any one time the world has a very limited number of Steve Jobs or Winston Churchills or Thomas Watson the firsts,' says Kotter. 'These are wonderful people and we can learn much from them, but praying for a few more of them to solve the world's problems is not a great idea.' Bd500 hytera programing software.
Celebrating individual leaders can also cause some to forget that it is never just one person running the show, adds Marsh.
'Leadership needs to be clear and strategic, but it also needs to be collaborative both between and within organisations.'
'You've got to be able to listen, to engage, to emphasise. You need to be maintaining a customer focus and growing the people around you.' At a time when many businesses are facing budget cuts, such qualities are essential, she adds.
For Julie Davenport, founder and chief executive of Good Energy, the path to effective management and leadership begins at school.
Difference Between Leader And Manager
While communication and writing should be nutured in the classroom, team work exercises should also be prioritised.
'These can be developed through other areas including sport, art, design, and music, activities that aren't confined to the classroom and are sometimes neglected in the push for academic results.'
These soft skills, Gosling agrees, are essential to all those helping to run an organisation. 'There are people who have a lot of great qualities and capacities for huge workloads or discerning what is and isn't of strategic importance – but who have no ability to communicate or engender trust among people.
'In any workplace, these are the qualities that matter.'
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Managers and leaders are terms often used interchangeably in business, but can mean different things within an organization. The exact roles of managers and leaders depend on an organization's structure. Companies depend on effective managers and leaders to develop and maintain a successful organization. A company’s executive team must understand the difference between managers and leaders to know how to effectively use them within an organization.
Effective Manager
A primary difference between managers and leaders is that managers depend primarily on their skill, and leaders depend primarily on their characteristics. Effective managers possess three essential skills – technical, human and conceptual skills. Managers must understand the technical aspects surrounding the duties of their employees. Effective managers need advanced human interactive skills to oversee subordinates. In some cases, they may need to motivate employees and implement exercises that encourage teamwork. Conceptual skills allow managers to effectively communicate their concepts and ideas to other managers and their employees.
Effective Management Styles
According to a Dun & Bradstreet article, three management styles exist to effectively manage subordinates and maximize productivity. Managers using the participatory style may assign tasks to each employee, and that employee is required to complete the task from start to finish. The task assigned to each employee may act as one part of an entire group project. Employees who understand the importance of their role to the success of the group are motivated to complete their task. The directing management style calls for managers to establish specific goals and deadlines for employees. This style is effective when there are tight deadlines to meet. The teamwork management style pulls employees together to develop ideas and processes to meet goals. Working in a team environment motivates employees to contribute their best work.
Effective Leader
An effective leader influences groups or an entire organization to accomplish organizational goals. A leader is responsible for establishing overall direction and vision within a company. An effective leader knows how to get employees and managers to commit to her vision. She possesses a certain level of creativity that allows her to develop effective strategies that benefit the organization. An effective leader has excellent communication and interpersonal skills. Much of her success stems from the ability to inspire others around her. An effective leader is confident, focused, consistent and understands the importance of prioritizing.
Leadership Styles
According to Alan Murray of the Wall Street Journal, effective leaders use six primary leadership styles to effectively influence an organization. The visionary leadership style is primarily used in organizations needing new direction. Visionary leaders explain the organization’s ultimate goals, and allow subordinates to develop innovative processes to reach those goals. The coaching leadership style requires leaders to work with an individual in a solitary setting to help align his goals with the company’s goals. Affiliative leaders place an importance on teamwork and cohesion to increase motivation and build employee morale. The democratic leadership style allows leaders to solicit the ideas, knowledge and skills of peers and subordinates to make important organizational decisions. A leader using the pace-setting style establishes goals that require employees to perform at high levels. Commanding leaders, similar to military leaders, give orders that they expect employees to carry out.
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Johnson, Rose. 'What Are the Essential Differences Between Being an Effective Manager & an Effective Leader?' Small Business - Chron.com, http://smallbusiness.chron.com/essential-differences-between-being-effective-manager-effective-leader-32963.html. Accessed 29 June 2019.
Johnson, Rose. (n.d.). What Are the Essential Differences Between Being an Effective Manager & an Effective Leader? Small Business - Chron.com. Retrieved from http://smallbusiness.chron.com/essential-differences-between-being-effective-manager-effective-leader-32963.html
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In a nursing environment, there are clear distinctions between a leader and a manager. While a manager has generally been given, or delegated authority that is not necessarily true of a leader. A nurse can be a leader because of his or her skills or personality. These are not traits that have been delegated. Learning the differences in management versus leadership can help nurses become both a better manager and a good leader, and therefore, a better nurse.
Definitions
Leadership is usually identified with focus and vision. Leaders tend to influence those around them in a positive manner. In a nursing environment, this influence is not just limited to peers. Nursing leadership can have some of its greatest impact on patients and their families.
Management can be defined as a system for the best use of resources. While resources includes items like funding, facilities, and supplies, management’s most critical resource is its people. Management has control of all of these resources, but is best served by using its interpersonal skills to help manage its people. It is in managing these human resources that leadership has its greatest impact.
Impact on Patients
The management versus leadership discussion without question affects patient care. Efficient and effective management can make sure staffing levels are sufficient, and the right combinations of skill sets are available. Management obviously also has an impact on timeliness of care, record keeping, and patient follow-up. Effective management can also make sure there are nursing leaders placed on shifts for effective guidance of less experienced staff. The impact of a well-managed team on the patient experience cannot be over-stated.
Nursing leaders can also have a profound effect on patient care. While nurses are most often viewed as care-takers, nursing leaders help empower patients to take ownership and responsibility for their care. This empowerment can not only help the patient in their current situation, but in going forward into the future. A nurse may care for a patient while he or she recovers. A nurse leader will show a patient the way to recovery, and lead him or her there.
Qualities of a Good Nurse Leader/Manager
In a column for NurseTogether.com, Stephanie Staples, a nurse, advocate and speaker, shares her top five leadership qualities that she feels every nurse should have. They include:
•Communication – Getting a message across effectively.
•Growth – Dealing with the unknown and change.
•Courage – Knowing when to take risks.
•Appreciation – Gratitude for others and self-appreciation.
•Self-confidence – Knowing what needs to be done.
•Growth – Dealing with the unknown and change.
•Courage – Knowing when to take risks.
•Appreciation – Gratitude for others and self-appreciation.
•Self-confidence – Knowing what needs to be done.
A list of ten top nursing manager qualities was published by the American Journal of Nursing in August of 2004. Its qualities include:
•Be a great communicator
•Be accessible and available to staff
•Be a staff advocate and reliable source
•Be reasonable, consistent, fair, and honest
•Have a good sense of humor
•Empower and motivate staff
•Be an effective decision maker, as well as crisis and conflict manager
•Be organized, yet flexible and creative
•Set standards and a clear professional example
•Respect for staff as professionals
•Be accessible and available to staff
•Be a staff advocate and reliable source
•Be reasonable, consistent, fair, and honest
•Have a good sense of humor
•Empower and motivate staff
•Be an effective decision maker, as well as crisis and conflict manager
•Be organized, yet flexible and creative
•Set standards and a clear professional example
•Respect for staff as professionals
Today, an advanced nursing degree is required for most nurse manager positions. There is little debate that better management skills and better leadership skills can make the nursing environment a happier, healthier environment for healthcare professionals and their patients alike.
Have you ever thought about your leadership role being similar to a parent's role? I began to see the similarities some years ago when, as a young parent and manager, I was trying to do my best in both roles. You can learn a lot about leadership just paying enough attention to raising your kids and also the other way around. Every human being has in his inner self a set of fundamental values upon which he will drive his life. Those values are learned from our parents, but they can be influenced or changed by other leaders in our lives.
What's the point of this story? Well, skipping a lot of details and many mistakes that I've made, the point is that we should look to our leadership roles more like a parenting journey than an authority game, based on the old-school principles, command and control. Thus, a great leader would act many times as a good parent and not as a boss.
They would:
1. Establish a framework - based on values, not on rules. When you are in a leadership position, sooner or later, your people will copy your behavior no matter how often your core values are written on the walls of your company. On the long term, it is absolutely useless to tell them what to do. Your child will end up doing what he is seeing more often at home and not what he's been asked by his parents. In this rapid changing times, the more rules and procedures you have in your company, the less your people would be creative and willing to take responsibilities. If you live your values day by day, the rules will come naturally for everyone and that is the culture of your company.
2. Coach and train. Try to imagine your newbies as newborn babies then you will be more patient about their evolution. You will sustain your newcomer to walk, you will pick him up when he's fallen down and you will be happy (and show it!) when he succeeded in walking his first steps. My generation has been educated in a 'no-mistakes-allowed' environment. We had to obey all the (stupid) rules of our homes, our schools, our jobs. This is fundamentally wrong. When you don't tolerate mistakes you don't encourage innovation and your people will either become dumb and lazy or they will leave. As a consequence, your organization will be more and more rigid and will lose countless occasions to learn and develop. Only the rule breakers make history.
3. Create opportunities - remove obstacles. The vast majority of parents want for their children a better life than they had. They would do anything to create better and faster lanes for them, hopefully according with their innate talents. Great leaders act the same: they carefully identify optimal career paths for their people and sponsor them to reach their full potential.
4. Let them drive. It comes a time when you have to let your people drive the business. It's like the first time you give your car keys to your son or daughter and let them drive alone. Deep in your heart you are a bit concerned, but you smile and just say 'Drive carefully, my dear!'. The most important thing for everybody, either your children or your people at the office, is to show them trust, especially when they stumble. In this unpredictable environment, you need to push the decision-making process as close to the front line as you can, allowing your people to drive the business. And only when your apprentices are going farther than you did, you can be sure that you are a good leader.
Dangerous and moving download album. 5. Sacrifice themselves for their people. This is the most important one. As Simon Sinek said in his TED talk, great leaders make you feel safe because they do behave like protective parents and they would sacrifice themselves for their followers. As a parent would you put your job, your status, your wealth or even your life at the stake for your children? Most probably, yes. How many of the leaders you have known would even jeopardize their positions only to keep their promises made to their teams? Most probably, very few of them. When a leader is ready to do that for any member of his team, people will know it and they will follow him anywhere.
You can forget the command and control style if your people share the same values with you: Passion, Trust, Courage, Humility, Sharing, Honesty, Loyalty, Openness..
A very powerful quote influenced my mindset in my early career: 'Leading by example is not the best way to run a team, it's the only way to lead people to great achievements..'. Say what you think and do what you say. That's integrity, the most important trait of a leader, either president or parent.
A very powerful quote influenced my mindset in my early career: 'Leading by example is not the best way to run a team, it's the only way to lead people to great achievements..'. Say what you think and do what you say. That's integrity, the most important trait of a leader, either president or parent.
Parenting is the oldest form of leadership, but somehow, while running our businesses, we fail to make connections between these two roles. Remember NLP - the kid inside us never dies. When do you think it's more appropriate to act as a good parent than as a boss? Think about this perspective.