Developing the Leader-Manager Concept!

A very strategic consideration in this subject of comparing leadership and management is in the comparism of the differences in effectiveness and efficiency. Effectiveness is doing the right things while efficiency is doing things right. Leadership is about doing the right things, ethics, morals etc. while management is about being very efficient, doing things right, maintaining the status quo without distorting due processes. So while the ethically-minded leader is asking whether right things are being done, the task-minded manager want to know if things have been done right and properly.

It is important to note however that there is no better approach to leadership amongst being effectiveness-driven, or being efficiency-driven. In been effectiveness-driven, the leader cannot achieve wholesome results by concerning him/herself mainly with doing the right things without being bothered about ‘how’ (the processes through which), the ‘right’ things are done, because, one can actually do the right things wrongly. In the same vein, the manager whose leadership parameter is mainly in ensuring that things are done right without been concerned about whether the right things are being done is also only right by half. This is because most of the times, things can be done properly, or rightly without being the right things.

For an individual’s optimum leadership effectiveness, one must neither be efficiency-driven or effectiveness-driven but should work assiduously toward a perfect combination of both efficiency – doing things right, and effectiveness – doing the right things. This is the state that John Maxwell and other leadership experts describe as ‘excellence’ which is the perfect combination of doing ‘the right things, right’ at the right time, all the time. In other words, it must matter to the leader or the manager to do the right things, as it must matter to them to do things right. In which case the right things do not suffer at the mercy of processes through which they get done, while at the same time, processes do not suffer at the mercy or the’rightness’ of what is being done. The most effective and indeed most efficient leader or manager therefore is the leader-manager who has developed his/her expertise to the point of being able to effortlessly or naturally DO THE RIGHT THINGS RIGHT, AT THE RIGHT TIME, ALL THE TIME. That will be the excellence-driven leader or manager, the goal for every leader and manager.

The leader-manager is interested in being efficient and also in being effective. The leader-manager is keen at being people-driven as well as in being target-driven so as to achieve the greatest happiness of the greatest number. While it gives the leader good feeling to be loved, appreciated, admired and acknowledged by their followers, they must also be motivated in being accepted and acknowledge by those that placed them in power – their employers and superiors. When the satisfaction of the subordinates comes at the mercy of the satisfaction of the employer, the leader suffers the lack of recognition and promotion. Also, when the satisfaction of the employer comes at the mercy of that of the subordinates, the manager is seen as a bootlicker, oppressor, sycophant and a self-serving bully. S/he will lack in the respect and dignity of genuine heartfelt-followership. S/he cannot enjoy his/her leadership. But the leader-manager is that which is able to create a balance and ensure that to a high degree, his or her followers as well as superiors are satisfied with dividends from their leadership career.

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