Noah and Leadership

I’m sure plenty of us will have heard one of the classic definitions of the difference between Leadership and Management:

When Noah heard the weather forecast he ordered the building of the ark. That’s Leadership.

Then he looked around and said, "Make sure the elephants don't see what the rabbits are up to." That’s Management.

So, not to put too finer point on it, Leadership is having the longer-term strategic vision for your organisation, how it will grow, develop and mature. And Management is the day-to-day overseeing and tactical supervision & administration of the business.

Now, that’s not to detract from either role. After all, both a Manager and a Leader must know the business well. But the Leader must know it better and in a different way. Now, by ‘better’ I don’t actually mean knowing the names of the spouses of everyone on the shop floor, nor what the canteen serves for lunch on a Thursday…

What I do mean though is the ethos of the organisation. What it stands for. What its future vision is. Where it will be in five years time. And that’s not something I’d expect a manager to have a grasp of, nor even think it necessarily desirable that they would.

Now, when it comes to coaching, I’d happily say that both groups can benefit from genuine, sustainable business-oriented non-directive coaching. Because, although they both have very different functions and needs, they each require assistance in determining their clarity of thinking.

Just because Managers improve the process and Leaders decide if that is the right process, it doesn’t make either group an island.