Management vs. Leadership

What are the best aspects of individuals that make a leader? The definition of what a leader is has been discussed and wondered upon for a long time in business, life in general and many other situations that happen throughout the lives individuals have. Management believes that when they find what it is that makes an average manager into a great leader their organizationally performance and production levels will improve and increase and personal career goals will be accomplished successfully. (McGraw-Hill, 2011) A leader is a motivator, a person in position that is not necessarily a management role but still goes above and beyond the expectations of the company. A leader is an individual who compliments others work and influences other to get the job done better each time, without a leader production levels can be very low and employee moral might not be as strong and job positions could be lost and gained often without a teamwork feeling quality and leader to look upon to follow and influence individuals to be more productive. Management is the conduct of successfully accomplishing goals and establishing routines and maintaining that production level in the company. Being an independent contractor for the North County Times, Northern San Diego County area I found that leaders and management are very different. Directly I had no real communication for office management as I was part of the early morning work shift getting orders delivered to customers. Appointed leaders and supervisors that I had direct communication with would always have a positive attitude and try to rely information about the weather and complaints and requests from the day or week before would be presenting on a paper form every night before leaving to complete daily tasks. Leadership roles are more important as I have worked for the North County Times. Since the company has so many departments and sections that have their own goals to accomplish management for each department is different for each section. Leaders are more valuable to the workers who are at the beginning of the design structure including the employees on the line, the carriers and cleanup crew. A leader will motivate and do the task’s that are needed to be done on time the supervisors have a good position in being in the door on management but the true management of the company comes from another department entirely, along with the writing staff and their management. Management for the North County Times are usually behind the scenes taking care of documents and filing information and keeping record of everything that goes on in the day to day roles and responsibilities of the employees. The roles and responsibilities that supervisors have are the motivational roles. Each department is effected by the previous department on the line of material completion. The writers have a deadline to meet so the print machines can be used, the print machines require maintenance which the department has to prepare for daily, and when the printing is completed the material comes to the supervisors who divide the material for each carrier. If one department is slow or non-responsive to the deadline production is halted and roles and responsibilities change and focus on the problem area becomes first priority to get production levels back on track. The communication between each department to management and then management to the supervisor’s ending with communication between the supervisors and the carriers is vital and important so that all aspects of the job can be followed and monitored. Proper motivational communication before the deliver is made is important to keep moral up between workers and carriers. Being a strong leader means you have to make the decision to lead. The text stated two perspectives of what people want and what organizations need and how they come to influence individuals to take leadership roles within the organization. James Kouzes and Barry Posner set of five behaviors they identified which factor into being a great leader. The five key behaviors include Challenge the process, Inspire a Shared Vision, Enable Others to Act, Model the Way, and Encourage the Heart. (McGraw-Hill, 2011) I would have a strategy of my management to take on roles that require them to follow instead of manage so they can get a better idea of how production works and where problem areas might be and convey the information with other managers and find solutions as they work in different departments and areas of the company. A leader needs to be effective and management needs to be effective. They both are important to progress and production levels of a company, I would suggest a strategy of a series of relationship builders between co-workers. A monthly or weekly game or employee puzzle that teams can work on toward to build relationships and have the teams change throughout the weeks or months depending on the layout of company and how large the employee staff is. I found that a game theme was good to motivate and build relationships when I was working at the Boys and Girls Club of North Valley, we were divided into teams of either 2 or 3 depending on the work week and we had no winners just keep it all in good fun and it helped build our relationships as co-workers when we have to build relationships with the children and interact with athletics and after school homework building the relationship between us was a great move so that we could be able to work better when we had the children in the building and our communication levels where up and we were on top of all situations. Some themes can be fun but when competition is involved you run the risk of driving wedges between employees and the goal of making leaders is to build bridges between employees and have that great leader build that great relationship with co-workers and motivate co-workers, management and executives of the company. A leader is a great valuable and important part of any business structure design but it is most important to be able to give that leader the chance to shine and build all employees up to that confident level to take charge of a situation for the best and have the best results.