Leadership and Management

Leadership and Management

Introduction

Although the words management and leadership exist in the same context, they are two very different concepts. Leadership can be an asset to management but unfortunately not all managers have leadership abilities (Ricketts 2009). Management is about directing, supervising, or giving orders to employees, while leadership is about being able to envision a better reality and communicating that vision to others in a way that inspires them to achieve that vision. Management's job is to achieve the visions of leadership. In this paper the concept of leadership is discussed in detail along with the descriptions of the leadership theories. The paper also talks about the differences between management and leadership.

Discussion

Leadership

There are several definitions available to define leadership but there are certain features that comprise those definitions. These elements are; influence is involved in leadership, it is happen collectively and achievement of goals is necessary. The implementation of leadership process may differ but these components always play an important role in its execution.

Apart from these components, certain factors also describe the nature of behavior of leaders. Leadership is divided into two dimensions i.e. initiating structure and consideration. The behavior to direct the organization, serving to define and achieve its goals and also defining the actions that can be followed by others, falls under the initiating structure of leadership. On the other hand dimension of consideration is defined by maintaining good relations. A leader should be social, accessible, friendly and good listener.

Contrast between Leadership and Management

Both leadership and management are similar in many ways. Influencing factor, involvement with people and working to achieve goals in effective and efficient ways are shared by both processes. Despite of these similarities, there are some factors on the basis of which both fields are differentiated. According to John Katter (1990), leadership is said to be an old aged concept which is studied and observed for centuries while the concept of management is not developed more than ten decades ago, especially after industrial revolution. Many other scholars also believe on differentiating both concepts. For Bennins and Nanus, management is about having a command over routines and achieving activities. On the other hand leadership means to bring revolutions through visions and influencing others. Rost emphasizes on multidimensional influencing nature of leadership and defines management as a unidirectional authority (Kumle & Kelly 2006).

Different Perspective

The perceptions of people practicing both approaches are different. If managers think in the means of growth then the thinking of leaders is radical. At one hand managers only follow the policy and what is written on the book, on the other hand actions of leaders are based on their own instincts and intuitions. Emotions are the basic governing body behind their actions but managers perform actions according to their intelligence.

Leader is followed, Manager Rules

One of the important differences between management and leadership is that managers rule the groups or organization while leaders always lead them. It can be explained as a manager has to be obeyed and people often have no other ...