Currently, in Ukraine and throughout Eastern Europe, I observe many schools that provide management training. This trend has been developing in post-Soviet countries since the Soviet empire fell. The word manager has been rather popular for the last decade in this part of the world. However, when it comes to “leadership,” this concept is almost nonexistent; if the term is used at all, typically it happens in the context of business coaching or political domain.
One of the reasons that leadership training is not well developed in Ukraine and Eastern Europe is that the notion of leadership may seem elusive. Social scientists and leadership scholars have never been able to agree on a single, unified definition for leadership. Seeingly, every individual has his or her own understanding of leadership…or maybe even none at all. Quite often, leadership is equated with management and vice versa. So, are these two concepts interchangeable? Are they one and the same?
The short answer is NO While they may overlap at times, they are not the same. They overlap because both work from the position of power, and they both deal with people in organizations. However, even in this overlap, the differences are distinct. In general, managers are concerned with the status quo and use efficiency systems to maintain the status quo. Leaders often focus on vision casting, considering how to change the status quo to ensure that their organizations remain competitive in the rapidly changing global economy. Managers typically engage with their people from a standpoint of positional power (they are assigned to lead a department, a team, etc.), while leaders exemplify personal power (people want to follow these individuals due to their character, abilities, vision, etc.). Managers tend to be task-oriented in running an organization, while leaders tend to appeal to people’s desires, goals and values.
In his seminal article on leadership and management, Abraham Zaleznik notes that while relationships in a managerial context are controlled, rational and procedural, the relationships with leaders evoke “strong feelings of identity and difference or of love and hate.” The differences do not end here. Another seminal thinker on leadership, John Kotter, notes that “management is about coping with complexity,” while “leadership… is about coping with change.”
Therefore, if we were to choose language that helps us understand the essence of both concepts, management would be best described by words like stability, routine, standardization, control, reward and punishment. Leadership would be best understood through words like motivation, change, vision, direction, innovation. These are not exhaustive characteristics, but they help highlight the differences that exist between management and leadership. Does it mean that one is better than the other? Not at all. Contemporary organizations need both leaders and managers to survive. Again, quoting Kotter, “Without good management, complex enterprises tend to become chaotic. Good management brings a degree of order and consistency to key dimensions like the quality and profitability of products.” And leadership is important “because the business world has become more competitive and volatile. More change always demands more leadership.” These remarks first appeared in a journal article in 1990. Nearly three decades have passed since then. I contend that the understanding and practice of leadership has moved beyond the point of adapting to change. Rather, leaders often are called change agents now. I describe them as creators of new realities. These realities, once they have been created by leaders and their followers, are managed by those whom we call managers.