A leader may not provide management in certain circumstances simply because it is not necessary. This is where situational leadership comes into the equation. By being very boss centred the manager simply makes a decision and the workers must accept it. This usually occurs when decisions usually do not concern the subordinates themselves. And there would be no point asking the works’ opinions on it because it will be implemented no matter what. A leader is one that has a high degree of control over the decisions made – therefore being more boss centred. And this may be highly useful in a highly competitive market, where providing proper management would be too time consuming.
Some leaders may have management qualities but simply choose not to use them. It may make the employees feel like their every move is being monitored if the leader tries to ‘manage’ them. There would be no margin of flexibility on the subordinate’s side. This is illustrated well by Mayo’s Hawthorne Effect studies. This concludes that workers work better when they have freedom and control over their working environment. Employees feel more empowered and will actually listen to their leader. Because they trust him and know that he trusts them. A leader must not see them as resources that are used to carry out a job. They must be seen as people. If you treat them like people and not resources, then you will gain support for the ‘common cause’ (goal or task set).
When companies are in a bad situation they will not bring in a new manager, but a leader. Because that will simply mean they promote an individual already in the business. This person would not be a leader because by default he already knows the procedures of the business. The appointment of a leader will usually mean someone is brought it from the external environment. This has the benefit of new ideas, techniques and knowledge. This, if applied properly can have hugely beneficial consequences for the business/organisation. An example would be when PY Gerbeau was brought in to sort out the issue of the Millennium Dome in 2001. As soon as he was drafted in he started taking charge and sorting things out. He was solving the issue – looking at the problems and moulding solutions. He was criticising the way the whole situation was handled. And he actually managed to bring some good out of the dome. At the end of the whole quandary Gerbeau was so successful that he was being praised by many respected business writers and other professionals - "PY is a great character and gives an excellent insight into the history of the Dome. The fact that he does this in his second language with both humour and passion puts most UK businessmen and women to shame". PY Gerbeau has traits of a leader - such as judgement, ambition, integrity, drive among many others. Otherwise there is no way he could have overcome such a big problem. This just shows that leadership does work.
As it was argued before, just because a leader does not provide management it does not always mean they do not have the qualities of a manager. Douglas McGregor came up with two types of leaders. One was theory X type managers, who think the employee does not enjoy work, avoids it when possible, and avoid taking on responsibilities. The other was Y type managers who think their workers want to learn, seek out responsibility, and genuinely enjoy what they are doing. So the leader may feel that his subordinates enjoy what they are doing (classed as a Y type manager) and he/she will not need to provide management. Because the manager (note that I’m using that to describe the leader) feels their workers do not need to be ‘managed’.
When you’re an executive for a big corporation you may not need to provide management because you have other leaders doing that for you. By looking at the conventional view of an organisation (see theories referred to on page 5), senior manager would only have to lead, whereas all those managers below him would have to provide the management. The senior manager is not there to provide management; he/she does not need to care about ‘processes. They announce change and managers below them make sure that the change is implemented. Senior management can be seen as using action-centred leadership. Only team, task and individual are worked on by the leader. A reason why some senior managers tend to work like that is because they want to be looked up at by their subordinates. They don’t want to be seen as the manager who is plain, boring and does everything by the book. This way the goals of the leader are going to be supported far more than that of a leader/manager.
In conclusion all managers must provide leadership in order to have a focus in the organisation and inspire other individuals to work towards set goals. Not all leaders provide management either because they do not have the necessary qualities, the situation does not call for it, it is not in their job description, or they simply feel it is not necessary. Having a talent for being a leader will not automatically mean that you will be a good manager. You are taught to become a manager and familiarise yourself with the specific working of a company. Whereas a leader can hop organisation to organisation and be effective at his job by simply using his leadership traits (eg drive and integrity) to get the job done. The main thing is to have an overall leader to set goals, inspire and communicate well with their business. Otherwise misdirection and confusion will occur within the organisation. When working in a highly skilled environment a leader may only need to set goals and the team will work by themselves. And finally, a leader may feel his subordinates need a bit of empowerment and do not need to be ‘managed’.
Bibliography
Fundamentals of Management Ninth Edition, Donnelly Gibson Ivancevich
Management Fourth Edition, Stephen P. Robbins
The Guardian Unlimited Online Archive
Theories referred to
John Adair - Action Centred Leadership 1997
Situational leadership
Tannenbaum and Schmidt 1958
Conventional View of an Organisation
Management 4th Edition, Stephen P. Robbins pg 495
Reported by CCH, part of Wolters Kluwer (UK) Ltd and the Wolters Kluwer Group
Huczynski & Buchanan, Organizational Behaviour 2002
Fundamentals of Management, Ninth Edition, Donnelly Gibson Ivancevich 1995
Situational Leadership diagram, Tannenbaum and Schmidt 1958
The Guardian Archive, Wednesday December 5, 2001
Stephen Miron, Commercial Director The Independent
Douglas McGregor’s original work, The Human Side of Enterprise (1960) – seen in Fundamentals of Management (details of which are on page 1, footnote 8)
