Stop being conned by the old mantra that says, 'Leaders are cool, managers are dweebs.' Instead, follow the Peters Principle: Leaders are cool. Managers are cool too!
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Leaders are people who do the right thing; managers are people who do things right.
Most people think of leaders as being these outgoing, very visible, and charismatic people, which I find to be a very narrow perception. The key challenge for managers today is to get beyond the surface of your colleagues. You might just find that you have introverts embedded within your organization who are natural-born leaders.
Managers who don't lead are quite discouraging, but leaders who don't manage don't know what's going on. It's a phony separation that people are making between the two.
In the past a leader was a boss. Today's leaders must be partners with their people... they no longer can lead solely based on positional power.
The problem is, we elected a manager and we need a leader. Let's face it: Bush is just dim.
Because management deals mostly with the status quo and leadership deals mostly with change, in the next century we are going to have to try to become much more skilled at creating leaders.
When I came into the CEO office, I basically changed the entire management team. We knew that we had to change the company, so we needed a new set of leaders.
Leaders thrive when they feel creatively empowered, when they trust the people around them, when their confidence is swelling. Leaders make mistakes when they lose that same confidence, when they're fretting about their power base, when they're reacting instead of acting.
As a leader, you need to care deeply, deeply about your people while not worrying or really even caring about what they think about you. Managing by trying to be liked is the path to ruin.
A leader is admired, a boss is feared.