Elsevier

Business Horizons

Volume 65, Issue 4, July–August 2022, Pages 401-411
Business Horizons

EXECUTIVE DIGEST
Rethinking managership, leadership, followership, and partnership

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bushor.2021.04.004Get rights and content

Abstract

Organizations underperform, or fail, when members avoid partnering with managers—whether through subtle resistance, disagreement, protest, or walkout—to achieve common purpose. Managers should boost partnering not by affecting a pretense of leadership but through a nuanced balance of managerial authority and understanding of members’ points of view. The objective of this article is to sharpen attention on the concept of partnership with organization members and how it relates to some of the important previous literature. We also argue that some of the previous scholarly work contributes to misconceptions related to these concepts. Our work is forward-looking in that it is motivated by the dangerous societal and cultural differences evident in the world, differences that surround management’s decisions and that may induce an overuse of authority to quash disquiet. Using our experiences in both industry and academia, we argue that the crucial link between managers and members is leadership—not leadership thought of as directional and inspirational, but leadership as building a relationship toward common purpose through partnership. “Lead” and “leader” are sorely misused terms, and worse, substituting “leader” for “manager” is just plain wrong. We believe that managers become leaders only when followers agree to follow, not when the managers simply step forward energetically with direction. Managers are cheated by mistaken definitions. Reviewing past perspectives about what makes good leaders and managers, we rethink ways to enhance organizational harmony through a clearer understanding of managership, leadership, followership, and partnership. Only by thinking and acting as partners in common purpose can managers and members form the core of success in organizational endeavors.

Section snippets

Righting the four ships

Managership, leadership, followership, and partnership are best understood when considered as conjoined in order to improve organizational performance. We define managership as the way an organization’s vision, goals, processes, and resources are planned, organized, and deployed; leadership as the way a manager initiates conversation to establish and accomplish vision, goals, and processes; followership as the way members apply talents to support organizational vision, goals, and processes; and

Rethinking managership

We are concerned that the concept of managership has been diminished by the insinuation and intermingling of leadership concepts. “The leadership literature has largely focused on formally designated leaders and the influence they exert to foster the accomplishment of organizational goals” (Pearce & Manz, 2014, p. 218). We argue that “formally designated leaders” should be called what they are: managers. When people cry out that they need a leader, what they mean is that they need a manager,

Rethinking leadership

Leadership, we believe, is the way a manager initiates conversation to establish and accomplish the organization’s vision, goals, and processes. Leadership arises through personal interactions and is therefore distinct from a proper view of managership. In short, leadership must be put into practice, not considered in a void or merely outlined on a whiteboard.

As goes leadership, so goes followership in that it too must arise in actual practice. When a leader proposes an idea, people either

Rethinking followership

Followership has limitations, we believe, as a goal for managership. Followers follow; that is what they do, whether wisely or mindlessly, enthusiastically or compliantly. Followership, as we define it, is the way members apply talents to support organizational vision, goals, and processes. Common ways of improving followership behavior focus on making members more wise or enthusiastic but fail to recognize that mere following does not necessarily imply an agreement. Nearly 100 years ago,

Common purpose

In order to understand how to move beyond followership, we need to understand the crucial role of common purpose. Converting away from followership starts by preparing managers to accept discussion, and members to offer opinions. The goal of reasoning (Rousseau, 1762/1889) is the first aim away from narrow following. DePree (1992) asserted that leaders only accomplish something by permission of followers, and Carsten et al. (2010) viewed followership as an important construct of partnership.

Rethinking partnership

Partnership may mistakenly be viewed as a tactic for engaging members, but it is more a philosophy of managership requiring deeper commitment. Followers are not equals, but partners are equals—not in the sense of bargained negotiation, but in spirit and welcome. Partnership, as we define it—members working with managers to contribute ideas to establish and accomplish organizational vision, goals, and processes—is not a new strategy, but it will fail unless a manager believes in the principle of

Problems with developing managership and leadership

Recognizing that managership and leadership stand separately and side by side provides the basis for better approaches to training and development. Imagine being sent to manage physicists, or police officers, or construction workers, neighborhood gang members, librarians, fast-food workers, bus drivers, sales representatives, government clerks, coal miners, college professors, religious fundamentalists, or students. Each group requires a different approach according to members’ intellects,

Guides for managers employing leadership

A feather-thin difference separates a manager who thinks, “I am a leader,” meaning they expect members to agree with, or at least accept, their authority and decisions, and a manager who thinks, “I am leading,” meaning they are willing to encourage and consider innovative ideas, and yes, challenges, from members to improve organizational performance. But as keen as a manager might be to extend leadership to all members, some members may not want to partner, but this should not stop a manager

Leadership: A final word

Leadership is a delicate puzzle. Members may not understand their organization’s vision, goals, or processes; their hesitancy must be understood and worked into a commitment by polishing and fitting the four ship puzzle pieces into a unified effort until they form a commonweal.

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