June 20, 2025 • 23 mins
Join John and Greg as they discuss what truly separates leadership from management? While these terms are often used interchangeably, understanding their fundamental differences could be the key to unlocking your career potential and organizational impact.
Leadership expert Amy Hamilton defines a leader as "someone that inspires others to work together to achieve a shared goal," emphasizing the critical role of vision, persuasion, and communication. The best leaders cope with change, formulate inspirational messages, recognize their weaknesses, and communicate effectively across all stakeholders. By contrast, management revolves around planning budgets, organizing structures, commanding performance, coordinating departments, and controlling outcomes—all essential functions that nonetheless differ from leadership's visionary orientation.
As Stephen Covey brilliantly observed, "Management is efficiency in climbing the ladder of success; leadership determines whether the ladder is leaning against the right wall." This distinction matters profoundly because employees overwhelmingly prefer working for true leaders rather than mere managers. Cornell University research confirms that teams significantly favor executives demonstrating "prototypical leadership traits," while those stuck in task-focused management routines may find their careers permanently stalled. The transition from manager to leader begins with honest self-reflection, seeking diverse feedback, developing deep empathy for team members' experiences, and most crucially, taking accountability for results whether favorable or not. When you demonstrate responsibility without deflection or blame, you build the trust that forms leadership's foundation.
Ready to transform your approach and elevate your impact? Listen now to discover practical strategies for evolving beyond management into genuine leadership. Then share your own leadership journey with us—we'd love to hear how these principles are reshaping your professional path.
Presented by John Wandolowski and Greg Powell
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
Well, hello and welcome to Success in Secrets
and Stories.
I'm your host, john Wondolowski, and I'm here with my co-host
and friend, greg Powell.
Greg, hey, everybody.
Yeah, so today, what are wegoing to be talking about?
It's kind of an interestingsubject that we've talked about
in the past, but we're going todo a comparison, and the
(00:39):
comparison is sometimes not asobvious.
We're going to talk aboutsomething that should be pretty
straightforward what's thedifference between leaders
versus a manager?
Let me give you some examples.
Have you ever heard of someonecalled a manager and later was
referred to as a leader bysomeone else?
Or are leadership andmanagement titles essentially
(01:05):
the same?
Let me help you.
No, can both someone be aleader and a manager?
Oh heck, yes, I've done that.
But if you don't understand theessence of the difference of
being a leader and being amanager, that's something we
want to try to explore a littlebit today.
(01:25):
So, leadership vs ManagementKey Differences by Nikki
Greenhalgh from Daniels Collegeof Business, the University of
Denver, from November of 23.
Are you a leader or are you amanager?
Maybe you're both.
(01:45):
That question is the businessversion of the chicken and the
egg dilemma, while the terms areoften used to define the same
role and both are equallyimportant in a business success.
There are key differencesbetween leadership and
management.
There are key differencesbetween leadership and
(02:05):
management.
Now we move on to DanielsCollege of Business Associate
Professor from Grismer Fellow,amy Hamilton, who has done years
of research and teaching on theskills of leadership and
managers and to find theimportant distinction between
each skill set, and we're goingto be sharing her ideas and her
(02:26):
definitions and characteristicsof each the definition between
leaders and managers and howthey can work in concert in a
business setting.
So what is leadership?
Simply put, amy's personaldefinition of leader is someone
inspired to work with otherstogether to achieve a shared
(02:49):
goal.
Talks specifically about theimportance of inspiration for
leaders.
Amy Hamilton's personaldefinition of leadership is
someone that inspires others towork together to achieve a
shared goal.
She talks specifically aboutthe importance of inspiration
for leaders, the most effectiveof whom need to be able to drive
(03:13):
their followers towards along-term goal, even if the
finish line isn't in sight.
So she has four themes for asuccessful leader Having the
ability to cope with change andreact quickly in an
unpredictable businessenvironment.
(03:34):
And within that framework,there are a few important
characteristics.
So number one persuadefollowers to take the necessary
changes to achieve goals.
Persuade followers to take thenecessary changes to achieve
goals.
Two formulate an inspirationalmessage or vision that others
can buy into.
Three recognize personalweaknesses and find others to
(03:57):
handle those tasks.
Four communicate effectiveacross the internal and external
stakeholders.
That communication is reallythe key on all of those elements
.
But what I think is interestingabout what she's talking about
is what would be a definition ofa great leader someone that
(04:19):
actually encompasses to be ableto persuade, formulate,
recognize weaknesses.
It's involvement in terms ofmanagement, and the one
gentleman that comes to mind wasKevin Ryan.
He was a wonderful CEO andpresident of an organization
called Wesley Jessen that madecontact lenses and when he was
originally hired he was just aconsultant with a capital
(04:42):
investment firm and making anassessment of buying the company
, which he ended up pitchingthat he wanted to run the
company rather than buy and sell, which is what the capitalists
were looking at, and actuallybrought the company to either
number three or number four inthe industry before things
(05:02):
changed before in the industrybefore things changed.
But as a leader, he understoodhow to divide up the workloads
and inspire the people indifferent parts of the
organization.
He dealt with manufacturing, hedealt with R&D and he dealt
with the sales and marketingteam, and having that skill set
was a very important element.
(05:22):
But to also have the skill setto be able to step down, manage
the process when the process wasbroken.
A really good leader knows whenthere's time to be
inspirational and when there'stimes to give an order, and that
really was his talent of beingable to push people to get that
end result.
Greg, I think you have anexample of what you would
(05:45):
consider a leader from yourexperience.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
I do, john, thank you .
So his name was Ron Kidwitz,the name of the company was
Helene Curtis, and Ron was avisionary and he made the
company's mission visible to notjust El Cidre leadership or the
mid-level management, but allthe employees of the
organization.
He was very strategic in hisapproach, not one of those
knee-jerk reaction kind of folkslong-range planning, building a
(06:11):
story, building an outcome.
He had the gift of persuasionand it wasn't just because he
was a CEO.
There's just a way he had abouthim that would make you listen
and want to work with him stronginfluence skills and I would
honestly tell you, this guyasked me to climb the mountain
with him.
I would have done it.
Just an incredible leader, anincredible company, incredible
(06:32):
experience for an employee suchas myself.
So what is management?
So, carrying on with whatHamilton talked about before,
she leans on Henry Foyle's fivefunctions of management to help
define the role of a manager.
So let's talk about thosefunctions First.
One manager must plan and havethe ability to create things
like a budget.
Right?
(06:52):
Who does that?
It's not the finance person,right?
The manager does that.
How about organizing a workablecompany structure that includes
chain of command and roledefinition, making sure who does
what and people know who doeswhat.
Commanding and getting the mostfrom their people.
Right Management that's whatyou need to do, because as a
manager, you could probably dosome of it yourself, but that's
(07:13):
not the best use of your time.
So number two is organizing aworkable company structure that
includes chain of command androle definition and people know
what they're doing and who'sdoing what.
John, talk a little bit aboutcommanding and getting the most
from your staff.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
Yeah, A manager's role is significantly different
from a leader's role.
When you're demanding to getsomething done in case in point
being an emergency or working onan emergency team You're really
not having that debate thatyou're expecting from a leader.
You're expecting results andyou're trying to drive those
results as fast as you can.
That's that commanding to getthe most in order to try to
drive that result quickly.
(07:54):
That sometimes is what amanager is required to do.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Also coordinating departments so they know the
responsibilities of theirrespective teams.
And then, finally, controllingand measuring how a team is
doing against not just a budget,because that's important, but
are they hitting the performancegoals that were set out?
So let's talk a little bitabout the characteristics of
successful managers, John.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
I have a very good example of a manager that comes
to mind, and he was a very nicegentleman.
He was very good in terms ofthe basics of the skill and
taught me a lot about how to bea manager myself.
What was interesting is that hewould steal some of my best
(08:37):
ideas because, as a manager, hewas more worried about his
future than my future.
So if I came up with a reallygood idea, all of a sudden it
ended up being his idea.
And yeah, at a certain point wehad the conversation and the
laugh that I got was a line thathe gave me of you report to me,
I don't report to you, so yourideas are my ideas.
(08:58):
Okay, so that's a manager.
A leader would never go downthat road, but still a decent
person, and I did get along withhim, but I was able to go
beyond him.
I managed up and I was able tofind an opportunity to go past
him.
Greg, do you have an example ofa great manager?
Speaker 1 (09:18):
I do, john.
I worked for an individualearly in my human resources
career, so I'd already beenworking in distribution and
sales and some other areas.
But I had a great manager whenI got into HR.
She was very detail-orientedfrom a planning perspective,
right.
This was before there werethese automated tools and that
for project management right.
She had a little spreadsheetthing that she did by hand.
(09:39):
She knew who was doing what,when things were supposed to be
done, milestones, check-ins anda phrase we used to use some
years ago.
She was more than threequestions deep, meaning you
could ask her kind of high-levelquestion about the projects or
the functions that were beingperformed and she could answer
that.
And you might take it down tothe next level and she could
answer that.
And guess what?
She wasn't superficial.
You could take it down even alittle deeper.
(10:01):
She wasn't a subject matterexpert.
She had people that worked forher that did that.
But she knew enough of what wasgoing on to be able to
intelligently help solveproblems, work with teams.
So she was more than threequestions deep.
She was phenomenal.
So what is the differencebetween leadership and
management?
So, while the terms leadershipand management are often used
interchangeably, a well-runorganization should be able to
(10:23):
define key differences betweeneach of those roles we talked
about in the chicken or eggcontext, and Hamilton has an
easy way to differentiate.
So here we go.
A good leader needs to be agood manager, but not all
managers are good leaders, shesaid.
Hamilton added that leadersneed to be vision-oriented,
while managers should bedetail-oriented.
So what are the traits thatseparate a leader from a manager
(10:48):
?
And this is from society forhuman resources, april 20th 2021
, brian o'connell and brian is afreelance writer in the bucks
county, pennsylvania area.
So brian says this managers whodon't develop leadership skills
may be hobbling their careergrowth.
I mean, they're not going to goanywhere if they don't start to
get those leadership skills,whether it's an inability to
(11:08):
persuade or inspire others,craft a strategy or engage with
team members emotionally, bosseswho ignore their weaknesses
risk getting stuck at that lowerend of the management ladder
forever.
So they got to learn how to tapinto the traits it takes them
to become a high-level workingleader.
Brian said he's frequently seenmanagers hinder themselves of
their teams by refusing to getout of the way right You've
(11:29):
heard of micromanagers in thatand let go of the day-to-day
responsibilities.
This is from Ryan Dennehy, chiefExecutive Officer at Electric,
a New York City-based IT supportfirm.
Making the jump from manager toleader requires a conscious
shift away from handlingtactical items towards the focus
of making strategic decisions.
(11:50):
The fact is, employees want towork for people.
They consider leaders.
Right we remember those days.
Right, you want to work for aleader, not another manager, if
you're a high-level individualcontributor or have aspirations
to get higher in theorganization, and the data bears
that out.
Cornell University had a studythat found that employees, by
significant margins, prefer towork with a chief executive who
(12:12):
demonstrates what the studycalled prototypical leadership
traits.
Speaker 2 (12:18):
John.
What are the main conflictsbetween leadership and
management?
She goes on to say becauseleaders and managers have
different defined roles, it'snatural for conflict to arise
between them.
Hamilton said problems mostfrequently arise when the
(12:39):
company isn't on track to meetits goals.
Leaders might want to have youto inspire and support people,
whereas managers might say youdon't have the right people in
their roles and we need to cutexpenses, like regardless of the
reason for the conflict.
She goes on to say that it'simportant for leaders and
(13:01):
managers to come to a sharedsubordinate goal, to a shared
subordinate goal.
Hamilton also added thatleaders and managers must agree
on the company culture to moveforward whenever there's a
conflict.
Here are some interestingquotes on a topic from
noteworthy individuals.
Management is efficiency inclimbing the ladder of success.
(13:25):
Leadership determines whetherthe ladder is leaning against
the right wall that's StephenCoveney.
Or management is arranging andtelling.
Leader is about nurturing andenhancing, tom Peters.
How about a boss inspires fear.
A leader inspires enthusiasm,john C Maxwell.
(13:46):
Or how about Teddy Roosevelt?
A leader works in the open anda boss is covert.
A leader leads, a boss drives.
I think it kind of drives homethe point that this isn't a new
problem.
But being able to understandwho's leading and how to inspire
(14:07):
people versus how to tellpeople really is an interesting
tell on whether they're capableof taking that next step of
leadership being able to justnot only do the task but lead
others to do the task.
From my personal moment oftransition is a story about one
(14:28):
of the project managers thatreported to me.
That is now a director, and itwas kind of interesting the
comments that she made aboutthat transition.
She was task-oriented, being aproject engineer and having an
engineering background, but as Iapplied my craft and what I did
in terms of their leader ofthat department, I was trying to
(14:52):
show them that it's more thanjust the job.
It's more than just thedeadline.
It's the people that areinvolved.
It's engaging in the results,understanding how it's going to
be used rather than what was puton paper, and trying to have
that empathy to take a littlebit of the view of the customer
that we're building somethingfor and understand how they're
going to receive it.
(15:12):
The excitement of the beginning,of getting something and then
to understand that they'remaking decisions on how they're
going to be working in theirenvironment for years to come.
So being a better communicatorwas one of the most important
lessons that I tried to drivehome to anyone who reported to
me, and she was a very goodcommunicator.
(15:34):
But now she was poignant.
She was trying to drive to aresult that really went beyond
just meeting the goals ormeeting the requirements it was
anticipating and all of a suddenthinking strategically.
Greg, do you have an example ofsomeone that you saw learn that
transition from manager toleader?
Speaker 1 (15:56):
It's my own, john.
So when I think about inreflection my growth from
manager to leader, I think abouta couple of things.
One I was a first linesupervisor, my first role out of
college.
I have people reporting to me.
They called me supervisor, theycalled me manager.
I was a sales associate where Idid manage people, but I had a
sales territory I wasresponsible for.
And then I got into humanresources proper and I worked my
(16:18):
way up and I became a staffingmanager, training manager and
then an employee relationsmanager.
Then, looking at what we mightcall from a title standpoint,
the leader side, I worked my wayup to director of talent
management and a director ofhuman resources, even a director
of DE&I, but you know what.
Those were nice titles to haveand roles to be responsible for.
I'm not exactly sure the exacttime I've made that
(16:41):
differentiation from leader tomanager, but it certainly wasn't
totally based on title and Ibelieve it was when I started to
demonstrate those leadershiptraits with my teams is when it
occurred and that was somethingthat happened over time.
So let me give you some tipsfor growing into that leadership
role.
Again, going from manager toleader.
One how can managers step outof their task-heavy management
(17:03):
role and grow into trueleadership.
So, according to Karen Oakleyshe's a director of human
resources at a company calledFracture, an e-commerce firm in
Florida the journey to becominga company leader begins with
self-reflection.
We've talked about reflectionin these podcasts in the past.
We must truthfully assessourselves first, get feedback
(17:25):
from the team, peers andmanagement, and then complete
these tasks to find firm footingon the leadership journey.
So, john, there's some tips forgrowing into a leadership role.
Your thoughts.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
Yeah, I mean, when we were talking about MBR, one of
the most important things wetalked about was self-awareness,
and if a leader doesn't havethe ability to step back and see
what they're saying, hear whatthey're saying, understand the
impact and, more importantly,whether your audience is engaged
Are they blinking while you'retalking?
That whole thing about engagingyour staff is the difference
(18:01):
between telling and leading,because if it's going in and
your audience isn't grabbing it,you're losing a real
opportunity.
Greg.
Speaker 1 (18:11):
Thank you, john.
So, as we've said many times,feedback is a gift, so think
about assembling a soundingboard.
Find a member or coach to helpyou when you have questions or
feel you're losing your way, youwere my sounding board when I
was starting out.
Speaker 2 (18:25):
you were my.
We didn't work from the sameorganization, but we stayed in
contact and we were both like,does this sound right, Does this
look right?
Speaker 1 (18:34):
And I couldn't agree with you more, john.
It was an opportunity to workwith a trusted individual,
because this is sensitive stuff,right, and if somebody you work
with that can give you someobjective feedback and be a good
listing board, that's excellent.
We've talked also in thesepodcasts about empathy.
Develop an abundance of thatright.
The emotional IQ and compassiontowards others is paramount to
becoming a real leader.
(18:54):
Take a walk in somebody else'sshoes.
Realize that each of youremployees has a personal life
that will impact theirprofessional life.
John, you probably have seensome of that in your experience.
Speaker 2 (19:01):
Well, the biggest problem is whenever you have
those individuals that finishcollege and they're going right
into a white collar job and theyhave no idea who they're
leading.
They're just part of thespreadsheet and part of the
goals for the team.
They really don't understandthe complexity.
For me, I started in themechanical field and when
somebody that's doing the workis saying, not only is it dirty,
(19:24):
but it's rusted up and it'slocked and I've been working for
an hour and a half just tryingto break it free so I can pull
out the existing system, well,if you don't understand that
empathy, if you don't understandthat walking in their shoes,
put on a blue shirt, walk outthere with them and experience
it.
Understand it.
(19:45):
Trust me there with them andexperience it.
Understand it.
Trust me, you will have so muchmore of an understanding and
the employee will notice thatyou've gone beyond just sitting
in the ivory tower with yourwhite shirt and tie.
Take the tie off, get in thereand experience what they're
fighting, so that you have thatshared experience and it will go
(20:05):
through the organization in aheartbeat.
It's the best advice I can givefor somebody who's trying to
learn how to take that next step.
Never be a distance from thatwhole concept of walking in
their shoes.
Speaker 1 (20:20):
So, john, a couple others want to add One
canvassing the company fordifferent outlooks, and what
that means is don't just lookfor your buddies, don't just
look for your friends inside theorganization.
Sometimes that's when a 360feedback tool can be very
helpful, because people can sayanonymous, but you might get
that dissenting feedback thatmight be very helpful to you.
And the last one and I reallywant John to kind of close this
(20:41):
out with this being accountable.
What does that sound?
Speaker 2 (20:43):
like John.
Yeah, being responsible, whichis the essence of what got me to
the point where I wanted to dothis podcast, because the
essence of being a good manageris being responsible for your
results, whether you like themor not.
And if you think about thatstatement, that was done by a
gentleman by the name of MichaelDurst and Dr Durst taught this
(21:06):
program of management byresponsibility and to be
accountable, whether you likethe results or not, is really
the essence of whether you aremature enough in your position
and whether you understand whatit is to be a leader.
When that statement and thosekind of approaches are reflected
from other people that say youare the most responsible person
(21:26):
I know, or you're the mostresponsible person I know, or
you're the most responsibleleader that we have in a team
and I know you can drive it tothe result.
Trust me, people notice whenyou've taken accountability.
Whether it is successful or notsuccessful, there's an element
of trust that is there when theysee the honesty.
See the honesty.
(21:53):
So, if you like what you'veheard in this podcast, yeah,
greg and I do this on a regularbasis now.
It's kind of fun and, yeah, Ithink we've really enjoyed
almost three years of doing thepodcast.
I've also written a book calledBuilding your leadership
toolbox.
It's available on amazoncom andaudible and all the other uh
vehicles for purchasing a book,and we also did an audio book.
(22:14):
It's very cool, um, the podcastis what you're listening to,
thank you, and also in otherpopular podcast formats like
apple, google and spotify.
Dr durst that we've alreadymentioned.
His information is available onsuccessgrowthacademycom and my
email is wando75.jw at gmailcom,and Greg.
Speaker 1 (22:38):
I can be reached at gpowell374 at gmailcom.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
Yeah, so we want to hear from you Give us a word and
you've helped us develop ourprogram.
So we want to hear from youGive us a word and you've helped
us develop our program, soplease feel free to give us a
line.
Thanks, greg.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
Thanks, John.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
As always.
Yeah, next time, man, next time.
Well, hello and welcome to Success in Secrets
and Stories.
I'm your host, john Wondolowski, and I'm here with my co-host
and friend, greg Powell.
Greg, hey, everybody.
Yeah, so today, what are wegoing to be talking about?
It's kind of an interestingsubject that we've talked about
in the past, but we're going todo a comparison, and the
(00:39):
comparison is sometimes not asobvious.
We're going to talk aboutsomething that should be pretty
straightforward what's thedifference between leaders
versus a manager?
Let me give you some examples.
Have you ever heard of someonecalled a manager and later was
referred to as a leader bysomeone else?
Or are leadership andmanagement titles essentially
(01:05):
the same?
Let me help you.
No, can both someone be aleader and a manager?
Oh heck, yes, I've done that.
But if you don't understand theessence of the difference of
being a leader and being amanager, that's something we
want to try to explore a littlebit today.
(01:25):
So, leadership vs ManagementKey Differences by Nikki
Greenhalgh from Daniels Collegeof Business, the University of
Denver, from November of 23.
Are you a leader or are you amanager?
Maybe you're both.
(01:45):
That question is the businessversion of the chicken and the
egg dilemma, while the terms areoften used to define the same
role and both are equallyimportant in a business success.
There are key differencesbetween leadership and
management.
There are key differencesbetween leadership and
(02:05):
management.
Now we move on to DanielsCollege of Business Associate
Professor from Grismer Fellow,amy Hamilton, who has done years
of research and teaching on theskills of leadership and
managers and to find theimportant distinction between
each skill set, and we're goingto be sharing her ideas and her
(02:26):
definitions and characteristicsof each the definition between
leaders and managers and howthey can work in concert in a
business setting.
So what is leadership?
Simply put, amy's personaldefinition of leader is someone
inspired to work with otherstogether to achieve a shared
(02:49):
goal.
Talks specifically about theimportance of inspiration for
leaders.
Amy Hamilton's personaldefinition of leadership is
someone that inspires others towork together to achieve a
shared goal.
She talks specifically aboutthe importance of inspiration
for leaders, the most effectiveof whom need to be able to drive
(03:13):
their followers towards along-term goal, even if the
finish line isn't in sight.
So she has four themes for asuccessful leader Having the
ability to cope with change andreact quickly in an
unpredictable businessenvironment.
(03:34):
And within that framework,there are a few important
characteristics.
So number one persuadefollowers to take the necessary
changes to achieve goals.
Persuade followers to take thenecessary changes to achieve
goals.
Two formulate an inspirationalmessage or vision that others
can buy into.
Three recognize personalweaknesses and find others to
(03:57):
handle those tasks.
Four communicate effectiveacross the internal and external
stakeholders.
That communication is reallythe key on all of those elements
.
But what I think is interestingabout what she's talking about
is what would be a definition ofa great leader someone that
(04:19):
actually encompasses to be ableto persuade, formulate,
recognize weaknesses.
It's involvement in terms ofmanagement, and the one
gentleman that comes to mind wasKevin Ryan.
He was a wonderful CEO andpresident of an organization
called Wesley Jessen that madecontact lenses and when he was
originally hired he was just aconsultant with a capital
(04:42):
investment firm and making anassessment of buying the company
, which he ended up pitchingthat he wanted to run the
company rather than buy and sell, which is what the capitalists
were looking at, and actuallybrought the company to either
number three or number four inthe industry before things
(05:02):
changed before in the industrybefore things changed.
But as a leader, he understoodhow to divide up the workloads
and inspire the people indifferent parts of the
organization.
He dealt with manufacturing, hedealt with R&D and he dealt
with the sales and marketingteam, and having that skill set
was a very important element.
(05:22):
But to also have the skill setto be able to step down, manage
the process when the process wasbroken.
A really good leader knows whenthere's time to be
inspirational and when there'stimes to give an order, and that
really was his talent of beingable to push people to get that
end result.
Greg, I think you have anexample of what you would
(05:45):
consider a leader from yourexperience.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
I do, john, thank you .
So his name was Ron Kidwitz,the name of the company was
Helene Curtis, and Ron was avisionary and he made the
company's mission visible to notjust El Cidre leadership or the
mid-level management, but allthe employees of the
organization.
He was very strategic in hisapproach, not one of those
knee-jerk reaction kind of folkslong-range planning, building a
(06:11):
story, building an outcome.
He had the gift of persuasionand it wasn't just because he
was a CEO.
There's just a way he had abouthim that would make you listen
and want to work with him stronginfluence skills and I would
honestly tell you, this guyasked me to climb the mountain
with him.
I would have done it.
Just an incredible leader, anincredible company, incredible
(06:32):
experience for an employee suchas myself.
So what is management?
So, carrying on with whatHamilton talked about before,
she leans on Henry Foyle's fivefunctions of management to help
define the role of a manager.
So let's talk about thosefunctions First.
One manager must plan and havethe ability to create things
like a budget.
Right?
(06:52):
Who does that?
It's not the finance person,right?
The manager does that.
How about organizing a workablecompany structure that includes
chain of command and roledefinition, making sure who does
what and people know who doeswhat.
Commanding and getting the mostfrom their people.
Right Management that's whatyou need to do, because as a
manager, you could probably dosome of it yourself, but that's
(07:13):
not the best use of your time.
So number two is organizing aworkable company structure that
includes chain of command androle definition and people know
what they're doing and who'sdoing what.
John, talk a little bit aboutcommanding and getting the most
from your staff.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
Yeah, A manager's role is significantly different
from a leader's role.
When you're demanding to getsomething done in case in point
being an emergency or working onan emergency team You're really
not having that debate thatyou're expecting from a leader.
You're expecting results andyou're trying to drive those
results as fast as you can.
That's that commanding to getthe most in order to try to
drive that result quickly.
(07:54):
That sometimes is what amanager is required to do.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Also coordinating departments so they know the
responsibilities of theirrespective teams.
And then, finally, controllingand measuring how a team is
doing against not just a budget,because that's important, but
are they hitting the performancegoals that were set out?
So let's talk a little bitabout the characteristics of
successful managers, John.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
I have a very good example of a manager that comes
to mind, and he was a very nicegentleman.
He was very good in terms ofthe basics of the skill and
taught me a lot about how to bea manager myself.
What was interesting is that hewould steal some of my best
(08:37):
ideas because, as a manager, hewas more worried about his
future than my future.
So if I came up with a reallygood idea, all of a sudden it
ended up being his idea.
And yeah, at a certain point wehad the conversation and the
laugh that I got was a line thathe gave me of you report to me,
I don't report to you, so yourideas are my ideas.
(08:58):
Okay, so that's a manager.
A leader would never go downthat road, but still a decent
person, and I did get along withhim, but I was able to go
beyond him.
I managed up and I was able tofind an opportunity to go past
him.
Greg, do you have an example ofa great manager?
Speaker 1 (09:18):
I do, john.
I worked for an individualearly in my human resources
career, so I'd already beenworking in distribution and
sales and some other areas.
But I had a great manager whenI got into HR.
She was very detail-orientedfrom a planning perspective,
right.
This was before there werethese automated tools and that
for project management right.
She had a little spreadsheetthing that she did by hand.
(09:39):
She knew who was doing what,when things were supposed to be
done, milestones, check-ins anda phrase we used to use some
years ago.
She was more than threequestions deep, meaning you
could ask her kind of high-levelquestion about the projects or
the functions that were beingperformed and she could answer
that.
And you might take it down tothe next level and she could
answer that.
And guess what?
She wasn't superficial.
You could take it down even alittle deeper.
(10:01):
She wasn't a subject matterexpert.
She had people that worked forher that did that.
But she knew enough of what wasgoing on to be able to
intelligently help solveproblems, work with teams.
So she was more than threequestions deep.
She was phenomenal.
So what is the differencebetween leadership and
management?
So, while the terms leadershipand management are often used
interchangeably, a well-runorganization should be able to
(10:23):
define key differences betweeneach of those roles we talked
about in the chicken or eggcontext, and Hamilton has an
easy way to differentiate.
So here we go.
A good leader needs to be agood manager, but not all
managers are good leaders, shesaid.
Hamilton added that leadersneed to be vision-oriented,
while managers should bedetail-oriented.
So what are the traits thatseparate a leader from a manager
(10:48):
?
And this is from society forhuman resources, april 20th 2021
, brian o'connell and brian is afreelance writer in the bucks
county, pennsylvania area.
So brian says this managers whodon't develop leadership skills
may be hobbling their careergrowth.
I mean, they're not going to goanywhere if they don't start to
get those leadership skills,whether it's an inability to
(11:08):
persuade or inspire others,craft a strategy or engage with
team members emotionally, bosseswho ignore their weaknesses
risk getting stuck at that lowerend of the management ladder
forever.
So they got to learn how to tapinto the traits it takes them
to become a high-level workingleader.
Brian said he's frequently seenmanagers hinder themselves of
their teams by refusing to getout of the way right You've
(11:29):
heard of micromanagers in thatand let go of the day-to-day
responsibilities.
This is from Ryan Dennehy, chiefExecutive Officer at Electric,
a New York City-based IT supportfirm.
Making the jump from manager toleader requires a conscious
shift away from handlingtactical items towards the focus
of making strategic decisions.
(11:50):
The fact is, employees want towork for people.
They consider leaders.
Right we remember those days.
Right, you want to work for aleader, not another manager, if
you're a high-level individualcontributor or have aspirations
to get higher in theorganization, and the data bears
that out.
Cornell University had a studythat found that employees, by
significant margins, prefer towork with a chief executive who
(12:12):
demonstrates what the studycalled prototypical leadership
traits.
Speaker 2 (12:18):
John.
What are the main conflictsbetween leadership and
management?
She goes on to say becauseleaders and managers have
different defined roles, it'snatural for conflict to arise
between them.
Hamilton said problems mostfrequently arise when the
(12:39):
company isn't on track to meetits goals.
Leaders might want to have youto inspire and support people,
whereas managers might say youdon't have the right people in
their roles and we need to cutexpenses, like regardless of the
reason for the conflict.
She goes on to say that it'simportant for leaders and
(13:01):
managers to come to a sharedsubordinate goal, to a shared
subordinate goal.
Hamilton also added thatleaders and managers must agree
on the company culture to moveforward whenever there's a
conflict.
Here are some interestingquotes on a topic from
noteworthy individuals.
Management is efficiency inclimbing the ladder of success.
(13:25):
Leadership determines whetherthe ladder is leaning against
the right wall that's StephenCoveney.
Or management is arranging andtelling.
Leader is about nurturing andenhancing, tom Peters.
How about a boss inspires fear.
A leader inspires enthusiasm,john C Maxwell.
(13:46):
Or how about Teddy Roosevelt?
A leader works in the open anda boss is covert.
A leader leads, a boss drives.
I think it kind of drives homethe point that this isn't a new
problem.
But being able to understandwho's leading and how to inspire
(14:07):
people versus how to tellpeople really is an interesting
tell on whether they're capableof taking that next step of
leadership being able to justnot only do the task but lead
others to do the task.
From my personal moment oftransition is a story about one
(14:28):
of the project managers thatreported to me.
That is now a director, and itwas kind of interesting the
comments that she made aboutthat transition.
She was task-oriented, being aproject engineer and having an
engineering background, but as Iapplied my craft and what I did
in terms of their leader ofthat department, I was trying to
(14:52):
show them that it's more thanjust the job.
It's more than just thedeadline.
It's the people that areinvolved.
It's engaging in the results,understanding how it's going to
be used rather than what was puton paper, and trying to have
that empathy to take a littlebit of the view of the customer
that we're building somethingfor and understand how they're
going to receive it.
(15:12):
The excitement of the beginning,of getting something and then
to understand that they'remaking decisions on how they're
going to be working in theirenvironment for years to come.
So being a better communicatorwas one of the most important
lessons that I tried to drivehome to anyone who reported to
me, and she was a very goodcommunicator.
(15:34):
But now she was poignant.
She was trying to drive to aresult that really went beyond
just meeting the goals ormeeting the requirements it was
anticipating and all of a suddenthinking strategically.
Greg, do you have an example ofsomeone that you saw learn that
transition from manager toleader?
Speaker 1 (15:56):
It's my own, john.
So when I think about inreflection my growth from
manager to leader, I think abouta couple of things.
One I was a first linesupervisor, my first role out of
college.
I have people reporting to me.
They called me supervisor, theycalled me manager.
I was a sales associate where Idid manage people, but I had a
sales territory I wasresponsible for.
And then I got into humanresources proper and I worked my
(16:18):
way up and I became a staffingmanager, training manager and
then an employee relationsmanager.
Then, looking at what we mightcall from a title standpoint,
the leader side, I worked my wayup to director of talent
management and a director ofhuman resources, even a director
of DE&I, but you know what.
Those were nice titles to haveand roles to be responsible for.
I'm not exactly sure the exacttime I've made that
(16:41):
differentiation from leader tomanager, but it certainly wasn't
totally based on title and Ibelieve it was when I started to
demonstrate those leadershiptraits with my teams is when it
occurred and that was somethingthat happened over time.
So let me give you some tipsfor growing into that leadership
role.
Again, going from manager toleader.
One how can managers step outof their task-heavy management
(17:03):
role and grow into trueleadership.
So, according to Karen Oakleyshe's a director of human
resources at a company calledFracture, an e-commerce firm in
Florida the journey to becominga company leader begins with
self-reflection.
We've talked about reflectionin these podcasts in the past.
We must truthfully assessourselves first, get feedback
(17:25):
from the team, peers andmanagement, and then complete
these tasks to find firm footingon the leadership journey.
So, john, there's some tips forgrowing into a leadership role.
Your thoughts.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
Yeah, I mean, when we were talking about MBR, one of
the most important things wetalked about was self-awareness,
and if a leader doesn't havethe ability to step back and see
what they're saying, hear whatthey're saying, understand the
impact and, more importantly,whether your audience is engaged
Are they blinking while you'retalking?
That whole thing about engagingyour staff is the difference
(18:01):
between telling and leading,because if it's going in and
your audience isn't grabbing it,you're losing a real
opportunity.
Greg.
Speaker 1 (18:11):
Thank you, john.
So, as we've said many times,feedback is a gift, so think
about assembling a soundingboard.
Find a member or coach to helpyou when you have questions or
feel you're losing your way, youwere my sounding board when I
was starting out.
Speaker 2 (18:25):
you were my.
We didn't work from the sameorganization, but we stayed in
contact and we were both like,does this sound right, Does this
look right?
Speaker 1 (18:34):
And I couldn't agree with you more, john.
It was an opportunity to workwith a trusted individual,
because this is sensitive stuff,right, and if somebody you work
with that can give you someobjective feedback and be a good
listing board, that's excellent.
We've talked also in thesepodcasts about empathy.
Develop an abundance of thatright.
The emotional IQ and compassiontowards others is paramount to
becoming a real leader.
(18:54):
Take a walk in somebody else'sshoes.
Realize that each of youremployees has a personal life
that will impact theirprofessional life.
John, you probably have seensome of that in your experience.
Speaker 2 (19:01):
Well, the biggest problem is whenever you have
those individuals that finishcollege and they're going right
into a white collar job and theyhave no idea who they're
leading.
They're just part of thespreadsheet and part of the
goals for the team.
They really don't understandthe complexity.
For me, I started in themechanical field and when
somebody that's doing the workis saying, not only is it dirty,
(19:24):
but it's rusted up and it'slocked and I've been working for
an hour and a half just tryingto break it free so I can pull
out the existing system, well,if you don't understand that
empathy, if you don't understandthat walking in their shoes,
put on a blue shirt, walk outthere with them and experience
it.
Understand it.
(19:45):
Trust me there with them andexperience it.
Understand it.
Trust me, you will have so muchmore of an understanding and
the employee will notice thatyou've gone beyond just sitting
in the ivory tower with yourwhite shirt and tie.
Take the tie off, get in thereand experience what they're
fighting, so that you have thatshared experience and it will go
(20:05):
through the organization in aheartbeat.
It's the best advice I can givefor somebody who's trying to
learn how to take that next step.
Never be a distance from thatwhole concept of walking in
their shoes.
Speaker 1 (20:20):
So, john, a couple others want to add One
canvassing the company fordifferent outlooks, and what
that means is don't just lookfor your buddies, don't just
look for your friends inside theorganization.
Sometimes that's when a 360feedback tool can be very
helpful, because people can sayanonymous, but you might get
that dissenting feedback thatmight be very helpful to you.
And the last one and I reallywant John to kind of close this
(20:41):
out with this being accountable.
What does that sound?
Speaker 2 (20:43):
like John.
Yeah, being responsible, whichis the essence of what got me to
the point where I wanted to dothis podcast, because the
essence of being a good manageris being responsible for your
results, whether you like themor not.
And if you think about thatstatement, that was done by a
gentleman by the name of MichaelDurst and Dr Durst taught this
(21:06):
program of management byresponsibility and to be
accountable, whether you likethe results or not, is really
the essence of whether you aremature enough in your position
and whether you understand whatit is to be a leader.
When that statement and thosekind of approaches are reflected
from other people that say youare the most responsible person
(21:26):
I know, or you're the mostresponsible person I know, or
you're the most responsibleleader that we have in a team
and I know you can drive it tothe result.
Trust me, people notice whenyou've taken accountability.
Whether it is successful or notsuccessful, there's an element
of trust that is there when theysee the honesty.
See the honesty.
(21:53):
So, if you like what you'veheard in this podcast, yeah,
greg and I do this on a regularbasis now.
It's kind of fun and, yeah, Ithink we've really enjoyed
almost three years of doing thepodcast.
I've also written a book calledBuilding your leadership
toolbox.
It's available on amazoncom andaudible and all the other uh
vehicles for purchasing a book,and we also did an audio book.
(22:14):
It's very cool, um, the podcastis what you're listening to,
thank you, and also in otherpopular podcast formats like
apple, google and spotify.
Dr durst that we've alreadymentioned.
His information is available onsuccessgrowthacademycom and my
email is wando75.jw at gmailcom,and Greg.
Speaker 1 (22:38):
I can be reached at gpowell374 at gmailcom.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
Yeah, so we want to hear from you Give us a word and
you've helped us develop ourprogram.
So we want to hear from youGive us a word and you've helped
us develop our program, soplease feel free to give us a
line.
Thanks, greg.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
Thanks, John.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
As always.
Yeah, next time, man, next time.
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