
It goes without saying that not all managers are leaders and there’s nothing wrong with that. Some are managers and are some are leaders. There are, however, certain benefits of coaching your managers to be leaders. After all, people follow people not organizations. The question is, how do you get your managers to be leaders, and why do you need to do so in the first place?
Are You a Leader or Are You a Manager?
First things first; are you a leader, manager or both? There’s no right or wrong answer. The work of a manager is day-to-day. He/she focuses on day-to-day operations, planning and coordination between his/her different team members.
The leader, on the other hand, is tasked primarily with motivating & inspiring employees.
What are their pain points? What are their personal goals? How can they perform more effectively? What are their interests? These are some of the questions they have to answer. More often than not, Leaders are more in tune with the people aspect while managers focus managing on things; processes, systems, deadlines, etc.
If you supervise anyone, then you need to ask yourself whether you’re a manager or you’re a leader. Ideally, you should be both, but in many cases you find yourself one and not the other and that’s okay.
In our experience and from our research, a leader has the following unique qualities.
Leaders are concerned with the people aspect of management.
Leaders come up with original ideas and concepts.
Leaders always look at the horizon.
Leaders are innovative. They take risks.
Leaders think outside the box and challenge the norm.
Leaders are concerned with people, but they are not concerned with pleasing people.
Leaders go with their gut, but listen to others including those they are supervising. Once again, are you a leader or are you a manager? The truth is that many managers focusing on managing processes and systems but not people. The focus of top executives now becomes, what do you do to help your managers on their leadership journey?
A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way and shows the way.
-John C. Maxwell.
How Do You Develop Your Leaders?
The good news is that leadership can be learned. Yes, it is easier to develop a leader who has talent, but as we all know talent alone is no assurance of anything in life. It has to be accompanied by hard work and grit.
So how do you develop your leaders? It’s simple but complicated; set up a leadership development programme in your company for your managers and anyone with leadership potential. Leadership development encompasses everything from developing leadership skills to building confidence in leaders.
You can either to choose to develop an in-house leadership development programme or work with a consultant to take you through the leadership development programme.
What are some of the ways you have initiated leadership development at your organization, if any?
Do you currently have any difficulties identifying leaders in your team? We would love to hear your thought in the comments below.