Tuesday, September 10, 2024

I’ve been thinking about managing versus leading and how the two are often confused.  It’s likely you’ve had a great leader who is below average as a manager.  It’s more common to experience working under someone who is a detailed manager, but who has less strength in the realm of leadership.  If you’re trying to build up your strengths in either area, it can be good to know how to spot the difference.

Simon Sinek is an author and public speaker who offers some great information that can help.  He says processes can be successfully managed, as can a company.  However, he emphasizes, it’s difficult or nearly impossible to actually manage people.  Tasks can be managed.  Even output can be somewhat managed.  But people themselves, he says, tend to be a different story.

Sinek emphasizes that often what we are attempting to do when we try to manage people is to ignite their willingness to open up, take risks and help each other as a team.  What we are fundamentally trying to accomplish is to help them be the best version of themselves, in harmony with the needs and goals of the company.  Ironically, management is rarely the winning way.

“Nobody wants to be managed,” the author says. “They don’t wake up every morning hoping to be managed well.”  Instead, they hope to be effectively and even inspirationally led, beyond what they believe themselves capable of in any given moment.

Management asks the question “how many units can you put out in a week and how do we get that higher?”

Leaders ask the question “what do you see as lacking in the units we put out in a week and what ideas do you have to improve it?”

Management asks the question “what’s it going to take for you to meet this goal?”

Leaders ask, “what’s a crazy stretch goal you would set if there were no obstacles in the way of reaching it?”  and then they set about helping minimize the obstacles that lay ahead.

Of course, Sinek points out that a blended approach that includes some management and leadership is often required.  But he says that being a good leader is often like being a good parent.  As a parent, you have to make sure your child is learning and doing the basics.  That’s just good daily management.  However, the best parents do not have a single model that they raise all of their children to evolve into.  Rather, parents who are great leaders find ways to help each child become the best version of themselves that they are capable of.   Sometimes we forget that when we’re at work, don’t we?

I’ve worked with great leaders, and poor leaders; tighter managers and more flexible managers.  On any given day there will be unique stressors, frustrations and trade-offs that come with each category. I remain convinced of one certainty, however, that under a great leader is the best place to work.

Under a great leader, you might arrive at a finish line limping, sweating and out of breath, but you’ll have successfully finished a race you never dreamed you could run the entire length of.  As you celebrate together and rest a bit before the starting gun fires again, you’ll look back at how far you came.  It always feels worth it.  Because of the accomplishment.  Because you leaned in, were supported, you persevered and made magic happen.  Together.

That’s the secret sauce of accomplishing big things with the help of a great leader.  It is rarely easy, but it is entirely gratifying.

Whether at home or at work, whether you have a leadership title or you don’t (yet), take a few minutes to look around and ask, “where are we trying to go and how can I help us get there?”  You’ll be pleased with the results.

Until Next Time,

Mary Schuster
Chief Knowledge Officer
October Research, LLC