Balancing "Blue-sky" Leadership and "Earth-grounded" Management

In my?recent post, "Management is Getting a Bum Rap!", I discussed briefly how management has become a dirty word in the leadership arena and exposed the many flaws with this reasoning. Being a great leader is wonderful. However, great leadership without good management often results in faltering execution and disappointing results. In that post, to maximize personal effectiveness and business results, I advocated for balance between the leadership and management.

In this post, I share ten?tips I have learned throughout my career to achieve this balance between what I call "blue-sky, big picture" leadership and "earth-grounded, real world" management. Achieving this balance may sound like a difficult task to accomplish, but actually, it is quite simple to do. The key is to be flexible in your style and manage with a leadership approach.

Tip #1: The manager in you should?focus on today. The leader in you should think about tomorrow.

This is the classic balance between managing the "short-term" versus?the "long-term". Many leaders have difficulty with this balance. I have had success balancing short- and long-term initiatives by ensuring my short-term actions are in alignment with my long-term goals. One way to do this is to create what I call an Integrated Strategic and Tactical Plan, or ISTP (see structural template below). The ISTP allows me to cascade overarching objectives down to the smallest execution elements. By using this template, I am able to keep focus on the execution elements of today while maintaining line-of-sight of the longer-term objective, goal, and strategies.

Tip #2: The manager in you should be close to the details. The leader in you should never want to manage them for your team.

There is much debate on how close a manager and leader of a team?should be to the details the?team is managing. One school of thought says you should be close enough to manage the details should the need arise. The risk you run with this approach is that you could be perceived as a micromanager. The other school says you should give your team the objective, any boundaries that exist, the success criteria, the budget and delivery timing, and then get out of their way. The issue here is if you do not check-in regularly, you could be perceived as a distant manager, or even worse, an absent manager. I say the answer is both. Let me explain. I?have no desire to dictate my team's activities; trust me, my job keeps me plenty busy. In fact, I lean the other way and delegate "everything" (see Case 1 from my post, "Four Real Life Examples of "Out of the Box" Leadership"?for an explanation). But even though I delegate "everything", I still maintain a conduit of information for what is going on, while letting my team?manage the details of their activities. I stay close enough to the details to be of help if needed (see tip #3 below), but distant enough not to micromange.

Tip #3: The manager in you should drive hard for results. The leader in you should engage others more (not less) frequently when doing so.?

Tip #3 follows directly from tip #2. There is a definite balance to navigate when driving hard for results. On the one hand, you may need to?push?your team, and/or your colleagues beyond their natural comfort zones without frustrating them. On the other hand, you must keep them engaged, focused and motivated. When the stakes are high and you have to manage delivery of a particular result, my experience says this is the time to accelerate your leadership presence by increasing - rather than decreasing - your regular check-ins with your team. However, when doing so, be careful not to micromanage their activities. Your purpose for engaging more rather than less is not to do their jobs, but rather, to stay close enough to the information so that you help out if necessary to ensure your result is delivered.???

Tip #4: The manager in you should make the rules. The leader in you should challenge and/or break them when necessary.

Like it or not, rules are a necessary part of workplace society to establish and maintain process and order. However, if they become limiting, don't be afraid to change them. Here is an example. At one point, I inherited a business that required?strict travel approvals when crossing international borders to control costs. The USA is a big country and required approval for transoceanic flights only. However, colleagues in Europe and SE Asia, where the countries are small (i.e. more like USA states), were required to seek approval when simply moving from one in region country to another (i.e. without crossing an ocean). While the intention was good, the policy was slowing down business activities in these regions and limiting our growth. So, I changed the policy for Europe and SE Asia to require approval for transoceanic flights only. The results were improved morale, organizational efficiency, and better perception that I was "Leading with a Global Mindset". The message here is establish your policies and rules as a manager, but never lose sight of the big picture as a leader. Change them if they are not working.

Tip #5: The manager in you should manage your downside risks. The leader in you should separately evaluate your upside growth opportunities.

Often, some managers are so focused on minimizing?their downside risks that they?neglect to go after any upside potential?that may be present. I witnessed this personally several years ago with a colleague who was paralyzed by the business situation we were in. Our business was in trouble and we needed quick thinking and decisive action from all members of the leadership team (see "Master These 7 Skills and You Will be Well-Prepared to Lead Change"?for the details). My?colleague was so afraid of making a mistake - so afraid of the downside risks - that he did nothing. He did not fix the issues within his area of responsibility. He did not enhance nor accelerate the items that were working. Eventually, his lack of action and decisiveness cost him his job. My colleague?lacked manager-leader balance. What could he have done differently? He could have done many things differently.?But most importantly, he could have separated the good, from the bad, and the bad from the ugly. He could have eliminated the ugly, managed the bad, and accentuated the good. My message here is do not allow your downside risks to cloud your upside potential. Treat them independently and manage the separately.

Tip #6: The manager in you should do things right. The leader in you should do the right things right and at the right time.?

Leadership guru?Warren Bennis (1925-2014) said, "Managers are people who do things right and leaders are people who do the right thing. Both roles are crucial, and they differ profoundly"[1]. "The manager asks how and when; the leader asks what and why"[2]. To truly balance leading and managing, you must do both, i.e., do the right things right. However, I think there is a third element that must be considered - time. Doing the right things right at a?time when your team or organization cannot digest what you are doing can be as big a miss as doing the wrong thing or doing the right things wrongly. I have a personal example to illustrate this point. In one of my former roles, my?company segmented customers poorly and we had multiple customer ownership conflicts between different?groups. This was a real issue. On many?occasions, I put forth several potential solutions of which none were implemented. While I remain convinced my team and I had the right ideas, none were digestible by my management at the time of recommendation. As a result, I am equally convinced I missed the mark on this issue because I got the timing all wrong. The leader in you must sense when the timing is right to introduce your "right" thing or idea. Otherwise, you will likely experience a big miss - just as?I did.?

Tip #7: The manager in you should organize people for success. The leader in you should seek input and alignment when doing so.

As the leader, it is your responsibility to position your team for success. One key lever you have is to structure and organize your team appropriately. If you seek to balance your leadership and management involving organization change, then give your team the opportunity to weigh in on the change you intend to make or the structure in which you intend to organize them. They will feel included, empowered, and energized by your decision to include them in the decision making process. I have done this on several occasions; most recently in my current role. In an effort to unleash the growth potential I believe we have, I am systematically reorganizing our business, which includes redefining several roles for several team members. However, rather than doing this in isolation and then informing my team on "how it will be", I am soliciting input from my direct reports on the options I am considering. In some cases, I am even going one level deeper to the direct reports of my direct reports.?Yes, because I am entrusted with the overall health and sustainability of the business, I will decide how we are structured. But, many on my team will have inputted and contributed to that structure. They will be aligned to it, not because they have to be, but because they helped to create it.

Tip #8: The manager in you should hold people accountable. The leader in you should coach, guide and mentor those same people.

Many who regularly read and support this series of leadership posts are former employees of mine. My guess is most of them would say that I set high expectations for them, their colleagues, and the businesses we ran?together. Moreover, I suspect they would also offer that I drove a fairly high level of personal and functional accountability - for me and them. This is the hard driving, earth-grounded manager in me. However, I would be willing to bet that those same former employees of mine would say that I took every opportunity possible to mentor them, coach them, and guide them to success. If you spend the time with your employees that is necessary to help them be successful, managing expectations and holding them accountable is?easy because it becomes a natural part of the coaching and mentoring process.

Tip #9: The manager in you should?be firm.?The leader in you should be inspiring - even when being firm.

Tip #9 follows closely from my previous tip (#8). Holding people accountable evolves from being a firm manager and I strongly advocate being firm, particularly when managing expectations. However, being firm is not synonymous with being an insensitive, unreasonable, over-lording "jerk". I believe it is possible to be firm with your expectations and still be inspiring and motivating. In my very first post, "Leadership Defined!", I detail, based on my own experiences, how to motivate and inspire others. Follow this guidance as a leader?and you will definitely inspire and motivate - even when being firm as a manager.??

Tip #10: The manager in you should manage complexity.?The leader in you should manage that complexity simplistically.

This tip essentially says, as a manager,?be creative and sophisticated in your thinking and problem solving when working through complex issues, but as a leader, be agile and straight forward?with your subsequent actions and decisions. Keep your leadership style simple. Keep your communications transparent. Keep your team informed and manage your complex issues simplistically. It will be much easier for people to follow you if they can easily see where you want to go.

Conclusion

How would you?answer the question, "Would you rather be a good manager or a good leader?" Between this post and my prior?post, "Management is Getting a Bum Rap!", I hope I have convinced you the correct answer is, "I would rather be a good manager AND a good leader". Yes, to be a good manager?and a good leader takes a little ingenuity. You must be flexible in style and creative in approach. You have to balance the short-term and long-term. You have to be firm, yet engaging and inspiring.?Finally, to balance "blue-sky", big picture leadership and "earth-grounded", real world management, you must be willing to take leadership risks.?You must be bold and different. So, take the risk!?Dare to be bold! Challenge yourself to be different! Embrace the blue-sky leader in you; but remain firmly planted when managing your project, team and /or business. Best of luck to you!

Thank you for reading my article. Balancing "Blue-sky" Leadership and "Earth-grounded" Management is the 25th?article from Dr. Michael Edwards. If you enjoyed it, please subscribe to my Newsletter,?Leadership Explained,?to get notified when I publish a new article. Please 'share' this article with your network, click 'like', and/or leave a comment.?Click 'Follow' if you wish to follow me on LinkedIn. Have a look at my other Leadership Explained articles by clicking here.

References

1. Bennis, Warren and Nanus, Burt (1985).?Leaders: The Strategies for Taking Charge. Harper and Row. p. 21
2. Bennis, Warren (2009).?On Becoming a Leader (Twentieth Anniversary Edition). Basic Books: New York. p. 42.