Yin Yang Your Leadership Management Styles....PLEASE!

The Management of Expectation...Leadership without Management Brings Consequences
Yin & Yang

Questions...
How many times have leaders gone been silenced because both internal and external events overtook the mission/vision?  How many times did the leader blame middle management for the lack of organizational performance, mission creep, or demise of structure?

In the entreprenuer.com article, "If You Want to Lead, You Also Need to Manage", occupational consultant Lindsay Broder, gives sound advice on how to work towards managing and leading organizational teams.  One of the biggest issues is the balance that leadership must face when the goal is to promote the goals and aspirations of the organization.  Many times, leaders become the organization's biggest public cheerleaders, while leaving the day to day operations to managers.  There is nothing more distracting than the demise of trust in middle management that leaves organizations dead in the water.  Unfortunately, according to Broder, many leaders can end up taking a shortsighted approach to this issue, thereby missing the mark.  What are leaders to do in order to move back into a symbiotic relationship between leading and managing?

*Take ownership
Leaders must realize that they cannot just go off "into that good night" and not stick close to middle management.  In some small gesture, whether it be meetings with management, skip-level meetings with staff, monitoring the progress of relationships with staff, or even showing up and making their presence known, leaders have to engage in the day-to-day process of running an organization.  This is not micro-managing, but engaging.

*Mentor
How many times do leaders focus on going to the next level and all the while, leaving middle management to maintain the machine?  There is a mentality in the middle ranks that leaders sit in ivory towers, taking credit for successes and moving on to the next engagement.  According to Broder, mentorship should be the goal for leaders, while focusing on what the next moves should be. In some cases, it may mean coaching, employee moves, restructuring and redefinition of job responsibilities.

*Recognize
Leaders have to embrace management of process in order to truly find a symbiotic relationship.  In doing so, make it a point to identify leadership in the lower and middle ranks to ensure goals are being achieved.  Sometimes it may mean bringing in new talent to mesh with those who are currently in the management processes.  New initiatives are a great opportunity to bring in new talent and also stress test the existing management platform.

It should be the goal of every leader to find a balance between the ying and yang of leadership and management, to ensure there is not a demise of both.

TPP