Book Review on Management !

Blog #2 Assignment:

On Becoming A Leader

By, Warren Bennis

The author of this book is a Professor of Business Administration at the University of Southern California as well as a consultant to a variety of multinational companies and governments that span the globe. In addition, Warren also sits as chairman of the board of the Kennedy School’s Center for Public leadership at Harvard University. Through this article, we will discuss the major hotspots of his book, which include the characteristics of a manager vs. a leader and what differentiates the two. What is often missing or overlooked in the common workplace is the managers art of leadership. Aside from the “corporate clichés” of management that echo words such as micromanagement, promoting synergy, and scheduling, it is the ‘how’ that plays a big role that ultimately brings out the x-factor of leadership among management. The overall objective of this review is to provide a guiding light and relight the match of leadership and let it burn the candle of management to provide for a more successful and balanced manager.

In chapter 2 of Bennis On Becoming A Leader, the majority of the chapter deals with a manager vs. leader and the distinct differences between the two. Bennis describes the importance to develop and implement leaders, not managers. Personally, the way I distinct managers from leaders is that manager’s ideas tend to be scripted over rehearsed, and monotone compared to that of a leader who’s ideas and tendencies are fresh, innovative and based off inspiration and motivation catered through this idea of a guiding light. Through the areas of the manager, the leader, and the intervention between the two, let us begin to understand what makes these certain ideas tick.

Among the list of what differentiates a manager from a leader on page 39 of the textbook, I’ve decided to choose three that stuck with me the most. First one being “The manager has his or her eye always on the bottom line; the leader’s eye is on the horizon.” The second is, “The manager has a short-range view; the leader has a long-range perspective.” The third and final is, “The manager maintains, the leader develops. It is these three ideologies that differentiate a manager from a leader. The manager’s tendencies tend to be structured and read from a book. Oftentimes throughout the jobs I’ve had in the past, the managers words were not heartfelt, they’ve always seemed as if it followed a structure from a corporate policy rather than an actual meaningful, insightful and developmental methods. According to the international journal of project management, “Today’s project managers may not be equipped or trained adequately to handle complex projects even though significant efforts have been put into professionalizing project management and providing an ever growing number of project management education courses based on the traditional project management tools and techniques.” (Mengel 2008) This shows how the majority of managers are missing this “x” factor and to me I believe that is where self-reflection, inner-voice and independence come into play once again.

A leader already has these qualities, I believe a leader contains all the aspects of a great manager but has that x-factor that brings inspiration and progress to the table. Granted managers and leaders can both be successfully applicable pending on the type of work. For example, a General Manager for a winning professional baseball team, we would aim for consistency and sticking to the script so the qualities for the manager would be most applicable here. However a General Manager for a marketing firm, one would search for a leader with management qualities, keeping your head on the horizon and adapting effortlessly to change in trends.

I believe the main factor that differentiates a manager and a leader is experience within diversity, experience within adversity, and learning from experiences to fuel independence and self governed thoughts while maintaining this guiding vision. Anyone has the ability to become a manager or a leader. Same goes with the fact that a manager can become a leader, it just takes experience within these three criteria and reflection upon them.

Let’s not think that a manager is lets say, “better off” than a leader, or vise versa, but rather think if a having both management and leadership skills coupled together is the importance of management in a profession. Warren Bennis book opens new light to the term manager, and should be on the shelf of any aspiring, existing, future leaders and managers for tomorrow.

Works Cited:

Mengel, T (2008). Preparing Project Managers to Deal With Complexity-Advanced Project Management Education. International Journal of Project Management, 26, Retrieved October 9th, 2009, from http://www.sciencedirect.com

Bennis, W (2003). On Becoming A Leader. Cambridge, MA: Perseus Books