Pulling an organisation forward as a leader is better than trying to push it as a manager: Alan S Berson

Interview with CEO, Leadership Conversation LLC

Management is focused on short-term results while leadership focuses on the long-term possibilities, Berson tells Ankita Rai

It is said that the manager's job is to plan, organise and coordinate while the leader's job is to inspire and motivate. But aren't their roles linked and complementary?
The role of a manager and a leader are two sides of the same coin and a successful executive performs both functions simultaneously. Succeeding in only one of the two roles means that you will either not be providing the broader vision and getting the most from your people (lack of leadership) or you will not be obtaining required results (lack of management). When you look at the enterprise level, management is focused on short-term results while leadership focuses on the long term possibilities. The secret is for managers and leaders to find the right blend of what I call the management and leadership mindsets to use at any given moment in time; generally shifting from management activities to leadership ones .

With the rise of the knowledge worker, "one does not 'manage' people," says management guru Peter Drucker. "The task," he adds, "is to lead people." This stresses the role of mentoring and coaching in an organisation...

Pulling an organisation forward as a leader is far better than trying to push it as a manager to obtain results. Leaders ask great questions and managers find the best solutions to these questions; we lead by learning, not through what we know. Fundamental to both coaching and mentoring is asking questions, listening to the answers, and inspiring employees to find their best way to accomplish an agreed-upon end result.

The main difference between coaching and mentoring is in who defines the next steps to be taken. Inherent in coaching is the belief that employees will find the best way of accomplishing tasks as the manager assists them in determining their next steps. In mentoring, there is an assumption that the manager knows better ways to accomplish results than the employees. Being mentored, they learn what managers would do; while being coached, they discover how much they can do.

In our age of electronic communication, how important is it for leaders to conduct face to face conversations?
It is critical. Leaders need followers and must connect and align with them. The connection must be in the heart. Electronic communication not only masks the emotional content but it is also a succession of monologues. Here are three e-mail tips:

• E-mails last forever; make sure the ones you send will be as appropriate in 10 years as they are now
• If it is going to take more than one outbound e-mail, pick up the phone or go see the person instead
• Unless setting up an appointment or making sure that broad group has the same information, you would be better off having a conversation