What Leaders Really Do – article by John Kotter - blog by Karl Janowski
“No one has figured out how to manage people effectively into battle; they must be led”
Leaders – coping with change
- Set a direction and create visions – broad based thinkers willing to take risks
- Aligning people – empowering them, getting them to believe the vision
- Motivate and Inspire – the more change the more inspiration needed
Management – coping with complexity
- Plans and budgets – planning is designed to produce orderly results, not change
- Organizing and staffing – create human system like architecture
- Controlling and problem solving – fast and efficient solutions to problems
This was a Harvard Business Review article that I read published in Leadership Insights a collection of 15 HBR articles. Although it talked about what leaders "do" it does not talk about one of the main Peter Senge leadsership topics: a leader leads through commitment to the vision, a manager manages though compliance. I think this is a key distinction that is maybe implied but not stated in this article.