THE LEADER -MANAGER DISCUSSION M. Afzal Janjua

At the very beginning of a workshop on Leadership for a mixed group of senior and middle level managers of a very progressive bank, at Lahore; an inquisitive participant asked various apparently unrelated quest\ions. Nothing very unusual yet, time being limited attending to one person alone could mean ignoring the rest of the audiences. The coordinator noted this concern and announced that lunch will be served at 2.00 pm instead 1.00 adding one hour to the presentation. The young enthusiast was requested to come at the dice and raise all her observations in a compact statement. She did. And here is what she said.

    * “I wonder how liberally we have started using the word “leader” for managers knowing fully well the type of people we are referring are far from being leaders. Are they leading the nation or community?

    * Using the word “leader” for the common run of managers, right from those semi-literate people managing small transport companies; heading sales teams to CEOs of large organizations employing thousands of people is intriguing.

    * Some of them are, perhaps, not able to put together their own ideas on a piece of paper, without the help of an assistant (with a sarcastic tone)

    * Some managers care very little about improving their communication skills, and work habits. We call them leaders; perhaps we are impressed with the jackets and perfumes they wear?
 

The young lady’s face showed signs of distress for the comments from the senior side and perhaps also on the phrase ”devils advocate”, not very common in our corporate culture. Yet, she maintained her composure and grace perhaps had nothing to regret for her statement.
Very interesting but not a very difficult situation! The discussion relating to differentiation between leaders and managers had to come later, but the situation demanded that the issue should be addressed first. If there was any challenge in it, it was simply to soothe the situation to ensure good cordiality between the members of the audience after the workshop ended.

Instead of a readymade answer a guided discussion seemed better. Many of them remarked, “All leaders are managers but all managers are not leaders”.

It did answer these questions but there is something more than that. The following points may elaborate these remarks.

    * A leader leads while a manager manages.
    * A leader is original, while a manager is a copy
    * A leader has objectives in mind while a manager is concerned with procedures
    * A leader in on the front, while a manager pushes from behind
    * A leader sets examples, a manager only expects “as advised”
    * A leader is at the center of action, while manager only watches from a distance
    * A leader is innovative, creative and thoughtful, while a manager follows the beaten path.
    * A leader empowers, encourages and motivates while a manager mostly supervises and controls
    * A leader is principle centered, he transforms and improves while a manager maintains.

Here the manager we are referring to is a common manager and not a good or effective one. Good, effective managers always have a blend of leadership to their style; otherwise they aren’t good or effective. Yet, we must understand that good writing skills may comprise vocational competence, essential for managers and leaders, in some situations .e g. College Principal or Department Head in a business organization but a union leader may need very little of them, as his competence rests on mobilizing the workers. All types of skills are not relevant or at least essential to all types of leaders. Here the type refers to professions.
One participant remarked, “Can we find a manager totally devoid of leadership qualities”? Good question! The answer was “NO”. He must have some of these attributes to run the show, ”Why do then we differentiate between Ladders and Managers? retorted the same person. Luckily, questions were coming in a good sequence and were relevant.

Well, here we must understand that we discuss these differences to motivate the managers to become better managers, improve their work styles, and achieve better results through people. The input relating to leaders and managers should not be tested mathematically but conceptually. Any approach taken to improve the understanding of people, should be seen in that spirit and not adjudged “judicially”
When we say, “All managers are not Leaders” we want them to become leaders in as much as it relates to their positions in the work life. We are not promoting them to the status of political leaders, opinion leaders or community leaders in strict sense of these terms. If organizations are treated communities, what is the harm in calling the managers, leaders?
There can be commonalities between work force leaders and the types said above, but again these can be discussed and very useful understanding can emerge. But workshop etc. of short durations, are concerted more with competency development. The discussions have to be directed to that goal. Very academic discussions can be more fruitful in academic sessions participated by researchers at a different level of objectives and mindset. However, when questions are raised, leaving them unanswered is inappropriate.
If all managers were leaders, then programs like this would not have been required. If some managers, do not qualify to be called “leaders, it is for us to make them worthy of this title. We may not achieve very high degree of success in this transformational effort, yet, whatever change is achieved will be worthy of time and effort.The questioner has added some details just to illustrate her viewpoint and perhaps she did not have in mind any particular person especially from this audience. At this the lady seemed relaxed.

“Well, I understand this viewpoint is only an effort to sell the concept of leadership in management. But can we really train people as “leaders.” came another good question.

“Yes, replied one participant. In the present era, it has been established that leaders are trained .The MBTI or “leaders are born” eras are over”. Some others endorsed this view and that made my job manageable within the extra time. I said, “Well, that has been a good discussion. In fact organizations have a responsibility of training and developing their employees and that is why such efforts must continue. We must encourage such bold questions, as mental reservations and hazy ideas hinder learning.

Like managers, most trainers are also not trainers by choice but by force of circumstances or simply “accident” of posting in this department. In organizations where training is treated as a dumping ground for not-so-desirable officers, finding such trainers is not uncommon. Here again the organizations have a responsibly to train the trainers to train.
One participant made a comment “Leaders have powers, Managers have authority”

Interesting! So comments from other participants were invited. Another lady in the group said “I disagree. Managers also have powers. In fact authority is power granted to managers by the organization. So let us not differentiate so finely between power and authority”. For time restraints, I agreed but added the type of power.

Legitimate power. Available to a manager by virtue of his /her position
Reward Power. The authority to bestow benefits on others
Referent Power. A manager enjoys because the people respect him
Expert Power. Enjoyed by a manager due to his/her specialized area of experience or education. For example a Deputy Manager in the Medical Department Dr .X approves a treatment that is challenged by a senior officer from other disciplines.

Coercive Power. Power used through putting others in fear of loss of job, position or respect or reputation.

Managers use a combination of these powers in varying degrees and that contributes to the development of a corporate culture. Use of Coercive power creates a bad culture.

It was time to add a little on concerns of managers/ leaders as under.

    * Consideration Vs Structure
    * Challenge Vs participation
    * Task Vs people

This added color to the discussion. Participative, innovate and team-building managers are better than control minded, status quo -guarantors and hard taskmaster. Process managers, file-passers, impoverished types are even worse. Here the coordinator intervened “We have passed some important points rather hastily. Perhaps an advance full day workshop is needed for this group” at the Head Office. Yes…these and some other approaches eventually bring out almost similar learning about management styles. Yet, discussing them in detail with structured excercisesss will be better.

Well to wind up the discussion on this point .I added, legitimacy, credibility, initiative, innovative approach and trustworthiness are some of the most important factors at the corporate level. . Here a copy of the Lao Tse’s poem was distributed which helped to sum up the discussion.

POEM BY LAO TSE
A leader is best when people barely know he sexists
Worse when they despise him.
Not so good when people obey and acclaim him

Fail to honor people
They will fail to honor you.
But of a good leader who talks little
When his work is done His aim fulfilled
They say they have done it themselves

Another very interesting question came at this stage of discussion. “The top level of leaders, the politicians whether in government or opposition, are leaders and you say also managers. How do they receive training?” The questioner looked at me as if he had said something unpleasant. A participant chimed in. “They receive education like you and me in the colleges and universities. The students’ bodies, literary societies, recreational /sports clubs, and other extra curricular activities like debates annual functions, camping trips, picnics and hiking programs, jamborees provide a good ground for leadership and management training. Unfortunately these things are losing importance generally but good institutions are very particular about them. Then these men and women go to civil or armed forces for service. There they receive very good training on leadership and management. The armed forces, I would say, have a much better and more effective training system. In fact much of the research in Training and development has come from this source. Those who go to trade and industry, have their own bodies and associations. This is how they are trained” This comment coming from a senior manager was very wise. Yet, I added.” There are some professions that provide still better opportunities, like Law. Engineers, physicians and architects have their own representative bodies but advocates learn it much better in the Bar Associations. They raise their voice against disrespect shown to laws, assist the Judiciary in playing an effective role, and explain the relevant constitutional and legal issues. They raise their voice very effectively through campaigns; representations, appeals, writ petitions and other legal means Election campaigns of all professional bodies are a training ground for leadership Local government bodies, and parliaments are also good sources of education on leadership. Here, a question was raised that some leaders have been controversial. The reply was simple “Being controversial to a limit is good. Controversy is a bye-product of conflict and a zero conflict level is neither possible nor desirable. A leader receiving disapproval at a very wide scale is harmful. But let us not go further to cite examples. To discuss controversy by creating a controversy can be a good approach but time being so limited, this may distract us from today’s topic. These comments raised some other questions like reliability, sincerity of purpose, trust, self-centeredness which were discussed briefly,
One gentleman who had been simply listening so far, came out with a comment “Teachers are leaders and managers in their own right. They prepare the leaders of tomorrow and are the catalysts of change” everyone agreed.

Now the best part of the discussion is that the gentleman, who had raised his brows over the newly promoted officer’s question, very kindly added, “I am happy, our new associate asked such questions in the beginning. The discussion that followed brought some new ideas to me also. Our group has real good talent. Sometimes, what seems obvious has often to be restated”.

The coordinator interrupted at this point. One last question, as the course outline has a few more important points, he said. And the question came” How do top leaders, CEOs and higher level continue learning about leadership”?

“The situations they face, the work they do and experience they gain are sources of their learning. There are institutions in the world and even here where top-level programs are held. And above all, reading good books especially autobiographies is very useful. Writing autobiographies or books based on experience is very important to produce the leaders of tomorrow. There is no ban on middle level managers to benefit from books and autobiographies. Those who can read between the lines learn better than others.” Even apparently off-putting questions are a source of learning. Time wasting, pompous and non-serious questions are easily identified and so are mini speeches in the name of questions.

After this input, the rest of the session went very well as a good foundation had been created for it. I understand, this will be read with interest. Any comments are welcome.