EXECUTIVE DIGESTRethinking managership, leadership, followership, and partnership
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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