Mngt 5000: Management Vs Leadership

Final Exam: Management and Leadership

MNGT 5000

Management and leadership are words often used synonymously. “Consult with your leadership/manager” or “Leadership/management has created new company objectives” or “Your manager/leader has made a final decision,” but do they really mean the same thing? There are significant differences between a manager and a leader within an organization. One can be a leader and not a manager while one can be a manager but not a leader. Leadership and management can be equally important to the overall, long term success of an organization.

Management is the process of working with people and resources to accomplish organizational goals. One must manage effectively to achieve organizational goals and efficiently to minimize the waste of resources making the best possible use of money, time, materials, and people. Managing the balance of effectiveness and efficiency is the key to a good manager (Brasfield, 2012, p. 14).

Management requires planning, organization, and leading, controlling, and overall performing. Planning is the first function of management which involves analyzing the environment, determining objectives, deciding what types of activities will be set, and determining the resources needed. This planning can apply to an individual, group, unit or the entire organization.

Organizing is the next function or step to management that assembles human, financial, physical, information, and other resources needed to accomplish the plan. When focusing on organizing, a manager is responsible for the overall structure of the company (Murray 2009, pg. 1). For example, a function organization is best for breaking down different departments of the company, and a divisional organization may be used for breaking down a larger organization with multiple products or services in different industries. A manager also has to consider the span of control, delegation, and diversity of each department, group or unit. As we’ve learned over the years and within our competitive environment, this type of organizing needs to be adjusted over time and have agility within the organization.

Management requires a leading function which is not the same as leadership. Leading is taking the management’s efforts to stimulate high performance by employees to achieve the plan previously set. This focuses on the direct reports, groups, or units the manager is overseeing. One can lead a group, department, or organization to a goal through good communication and decision-making, but people may not look at the manager as a true leader or possessing the characteristics of leadership. Management looks at the leading function as simply a function. The idea is to communicate with the group to align the company goal and vision with the employees and do what is necessary to motive and empower the employees to hit that goal. There is a missing personality factor and strictly an organizational management perspective to leading that differentiates it from true leadership.

The micro and macro environments are always changing and to be successful there must be adaptation to one’s management style. There is also the risk that the planning, organizing and leading is not resulting in success. This is where the control function takes place. Controlling is monitoring, performance and making changes as needed. There is a system for control which is setting standards, measuring performance, comparing to the standard, and taking action to correct issues. This is extremely important in organizations to understand if the resources and people are being used to accomplish organizational goals. From a leadership perspective, there is no systematic method to control because it requires inspiration and trust.

Overall, management within organizations has functions and systems in place. A sort of checks and balances whether managing to the external environment including customers, suppliers, buyers, or legal and regulatory or the internal environment including departments, groups, units, or individuals. There is an opportunity in management to plan, organize, lead, and control and to fail only to restructure to succeed as long as resources and people can still be utilized to stay afloat.

Leadership in an organization is different. A person can be an effective manager and succeed but aren’t necessarily a true leader. A true leader will go beyond the organization of people and resources, structuring and monitoring, and decision-making. True leaders are people who influence others to attain goals and looks beyond just the goal at hand. A leader needs to be an innovator and develop people to help work towards an organization’s vision. A vision that may not even be realized. A leader also focuses on people rather than the systems and structures like a manager. Kouzes and Posner came up with five key behaviors for leaders which are