Managerial leadership - not just leadership
A must in today’s environment
Many Indian companies including MNC are not doing well
as they are unable to face competition, pressure and
take "quick right" decisions. It is said that you
cannot do business with yesterday’s methods and be in
business tomorrow. A manager has to develop good
leadership quality in order to take the company to the
top. The style keeps changing as the situation with
the types of people. It said that Steve Job, founder
of Apple Computer possesses consummate charm,
infectious enthusiasm and overdose of charisma. This
really helped the company to take the lead. Korean
managers were able to do better compared to Japanese
as they developed managerial leadership quality, which
is flexible and open. This led to success of Koreans
in America and even in India. Leadership style should
blend with managerial functions. Leadership inevitably
requires using power to influence the thoughts and
actions of other people. An effective manager gets the
job done through high quantitative and qualitative
standards of performance with satisfaction and high
degree of commitment. A managerial culture emphasizes
rationality and control. Manager has to achieve
results so that people will continue to contribute to
this organization. It takes neither genius nor heroism
to be a manager, but persistence, tough mindedness,
hard work, intelligence, analytical ability, tolerance
and goodwill. Leadership is a psychodrama in which a
brilliant lonely person gains control of himself for
controlling others. Managers and leaders are different
kind of people. They differ in motivation, personal
history and in how they think and act. An effective
manager not only requires changing leadership styles
but should have :
Good verbal communication with good listening power
Manage time and stress
Managing individual decisions
Recognizing defining and solving problems
Motivating and influencing others
Delegating
Setting goals and have vision
Self awareness
Team building
Managing conflict
Today, how many leaders have imbibed such managerial
quality for effectiveness? Infact, today’s manager
with great leadership quality will be more successful
than just being the leader. Let is see what
differences can exist between a leader and a manager.
Manager motivates and leader inspires
One of the major differences between a manager and a
leader is that managers are suppose to motivate so
that people will work to achieve goals of the company.
He has to use all techniques to keep the people
charged. He is always trying to put efforts to keep
people motivated. He is always giving credit where
due, asking for inputs and participation. He is always
giving positive performance feedback.
The leader inspires others and therefore
self-motivation plays an important tool when
inspiration influences others. I still remember as a
small child many people stopped eating rice on one day
in a week at the behest of Late Lal Bahadur Shastri.
He inspired people resulting in self-motivation.
Self-motivation is the best form of motivation. If a
manager can imbibe the "inspiration quality" he can
become more effective. He can manage, motivate a
self-directed team better than a team which requires
his constant attention. Therefore, manager will be
more effective if he not only motivates others but
also inspires them. Mr. Ratan Tata, Narayan Murthy,
Azim Premji are great "Managerial Leaders". This is
the need of the hour in facing competition. This
quality will enable the organization to excel. He is
also an example to others. There is "no-dichotomy" or
split personality. The openness, transparent behavior
brings the people to a close knit family. No wonder,
team becomes like a "fist" and not individual fingers
of different sizes. Will such organizations go down?
Never!
Manager has subordinates and leader has followers
Manager involves combination of people and ideas
interacting to establish strategies and making
decisions. They motivate, reinforce, discipline or
punish, manage conflict, recruit people or train them
in order to achieve objective. A manager requires
persistence, tough mindedness, hard work, intelligence
and analytical ability to manage people. He cannot
tolerate chaos and lack of structures. Managers seek
order and control and are almost compulsively addicted
to disposing of problem even before they understand
their potential significance.
Leader influences others, evoking expectation and
establishing specific desire and objective which
determine the direction a business takes. The net
result of this influence change the way people think
about what is desirable, possible and necessary.
Followers have complete faith in their leader and are
willing to do any thing without accepting any reward.
They have faith in him. Knowledge, the satvik
character influences his followers.
Manager, if he develops the satvic and knowledge as a
base to influence people, can become a good
"Managerial Leader". Infact, sometime back in Walter
Bushrel – a pharmaceutical company, when Mr. Saxena
left the organization to start Elder Pharmaceutical in
1980 even the peon left the company to be the part of
Elder. Today, there are some managers who have
developed "Managerial Leadership". Recently, President
of Alkem, Mr. Guha joined Wander and took away 150
people along with him. Wander is a smaller company
compared to Alkem. People left so that they can be
with Mr. Guha. These qualities help the manager to
perform better.
Manager is a boss and a leader is a guru:
Manager influences people due to power, as he is the
boss. Boss is always right. Leader influences through
his sound knowledge. Manager is more interested in
gaining power. Higher the power, greater is the
influencing ability. Manager energizes his people
through seat of command. Many times he makes the
decision and announces it, or he may sell decision or
he presents ideas and invites questions in order to
take decision or he presents tentative decisions
subject to change or presents problems and gets
suggestion and makes decision or allows the group to
take decisions under certain limitations. Many times
manager aims to shift balance of power towards an
acceptable solution as a compromise among conflicting
values.
Leader influences through his knowledge, which is more
convincing to others. They are active instead of
reactive, shaping ideas instead of responding to them.
The influence a leader exerts in altering moods,
evoking images and expectation and in establishing
specific desires and objectives determines the
direction a business takes. The net result of this
influence change the way people think about what is
desirable, possible and necessary.
Can a manager not imbibe this quality? Mr. Narayan
Murthy is a managerial leader because of good quality
of "Guru" he has imbibed both the quality of guru and
boss.
Manager pushes and the leader pulls his people
Manager has to complete the task in a well-defined
time. Therefore, he has to push and cajole his people
to complete their task. He has to plan and control
different activities. An organization is a system with
logic of