Throughout our careers we will come across leadership and management opportunities however the two are often thought to be the same. In reality there is a huge gap between leading and management. Here is why.
Let us be clear on what the main difference is between management and leadership.
Leadership is a choice and management is a task.
Management is the task to accomplish a goal faster and cheaper than yesterday, there is usually a guidebook you can follow and some set metrics to tell you whether you’re on track. Nothing wrong with management by the way! It is needed and when nicely done it gets productivity going.
However, management is about manipulating the resources and repeating the same processes. Managers use the authority the company has given to them. You listen to your manager or you lose your job. They can’t make changes because that’s not their job. Their job is to complete tasks assigned to them by someone else in the company.
Leadership on another hand is about creating a change that you believe in.
Leadership is the choice of putting yourself on the hook to add value to someone or a cause you deeply care for. You get people to embark on this journey with you and cast a vision as destination. Making this choice is however risky, there is no guidebook and no accurate metrics to measure your progress. It may not work.
Leaders don’t care very much for organisational structure or the blessing of their superiors. They use passion and ideas to lead people as opposed to using intimidation and power to manage them.
Leaders have followers, Managers have employees.
Managers encourage predictability. Leaders encourage change.
Leadership don’t always start from the top, but it always manages to affect the ones at the top.
