To quote Northouse (2018), “Assigned leadership is based on a formal title or position in an organization. Emergent leadership results from what one does and how one acquires support from followers” (p. 15).

There have been several instances where I “emerged” as a leader. One particular instance was a couple years ago when I was overseas on a mission trip with the organization I do ministry with. The two leaders (directors) gave me a fairly large role on the mission trip and I accomplished it well. I also helped organize other aspects of the trip and sometimes would be thinking ahead and reminding the directors of things we needed to get done. The directors expressed appreciation for the role I played and how I supported them. Through leading in my role on my team and helping take responsibility for other parts of the trip, that were not expected of me, I demonstrated emergent leadership to the directors and other team members. The following year I was asked to co-direct that same trip.

The section on managers and leaders was very interesting, Bennis and Nanus (2007) described the difference as the following:

“To manage means to accomplish activities and master routines, whereas to lead means to influence others and create visions for change” ( p.221).

I identified that my ministry organization has a very combined approach to their assigned leadership roles.  Their roles often entail both management and leadership combined. However, I have found that the management side always seems takes over and it becomes 80% management, 20% leadership. There are good changes being made, but there is still a constant barrage of management tasks do, as well as national and local priorities that still make management a huge part of the role.

Personally, I appreciated Zaleznik’s (1977) viewpoint that narrowed it to the fact that managers and leaders should be distinct (p. 14). I have been thinking about what that would look like in my ministry context. Potentially we could have an assigned managers and an assigned leader who leads a team together. This could be a personal bias, but because I naturally lean towards leadership, I think if I had less management on my plate, I could really thrive in leadership. Our organization has entered a season of adaptive change and through this I am noticing more of my natural bent towards leadership, rather than management.

To conclude, it is clear there definitely is a difference between management and leadership. I think dependent on the context, personalities of the leaders and the goals of the team, it is important for companies and organizations to define how management and leadership interact, especially when trying to apply change. In defining how they interact, it could be decided whether to divide management and leadership between two individuals or combine it together in their assigned leadership roles.

Question: In your context, do you think there should be a distinctive management role and leadership role, for two seperate people or do you think that it should be combined into one role, for one person? Explain.

 

Monica

 

Bennis, W.G., & Nanus, B. (2007). Leaders: The strategies for taking charge (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Harper & Row.

Northouse, P. G. (2018). Leadership: theory and practice (8th ed.). Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications.

Zaleznik, A. (1977, May-June). Managers and leaders:  Are they different? Harvard Business Review, 55, 67-78.