Manager vs. Leader: Which One Are You?
What it takes to be a leader
Over the past few years, we’ve entered a time of what has been called “radical transparency.” There’s more information out there on company culture, salaries, and candidates than ever before. The one thing that’s still largely kept in the dark is the most important: whether you are going to have a leader or a manager. A manager, according to Oxford Dictionary, is: “The person who leads and commands a group.” By that definition, every manager is a leader. Thanks but no thanks, Oxford. We need more from leaders. A lot more.
It’s becoming rare to come across good leaders. Just take a look at what’s happening across the tech landscape today: there’s a lot of management during layoffs, but not necessarily a lot of leadership. But why is that?
Here are three big challenges for building the next generation of leaders:
Employers aren’t spending enough time training managers and giving them proper guidance.
Most managers are too caught up in day-to-day and busy work that they don’t have time for reflection and growth.
Employees are rarely given a chance to give feedback for managers on how they can grow and become better.
A lot of the time, this is all because the managers themselves were given no proper training or guidance. So what really distinguishes a manager from a leader? In my view, it’s emotional intelligence. According to Daniel Goleman from the Harvard Business Review, the most successful leaders have five key attributes:
1. Self-awareness
The ability to recognize and understand your moods, emotions, and drives, as well as their effect on others.
2. Self-regulation
The ability to control or redirect disruptive impulses and moods. The propensity to suspend judgment to think before acting.
3. Motivation
A passion to work for reasons that go beyond money or status. A propensity to pursue goals with energy and persistence.
4. Empathy
The ability to understand the emotional makeup of other people. Skill in treating people according to their emotional reactions.
5. Social skill
Proficiency in managing relationships and building networks. An ability to find common ground and build rapport.
If the best leaders are empathetic, the question is which attributes are most important - and which ones are hardest to find among the managers of today.
Keep smiling,
Dhoreena
Amazing insight, Dhoreena! I love the distinction between manager and leader. This really resonates with me:
> A lot of the time, this is all because the managers themselves were given no proper training or guidance.
I love the phrase from a great engineer Sarah Drasner that ‘You are good at building bridges so they make you a baker.’ Typically managers are first made managers because they’re good at their job, which is not managing but maybe programming, operations or creative. It can be confusing, then, to have this role shift especially if there’s no training. And, like you say, the work marches on.