Academic leadership can be attained in four aptitudes. Management involves more steps, but is easier.
Managing is all about caring for and feeding and watching the numbers, being concerned about the functioning, knowing and implementing the procedures, doing the evaluations.
It’s the analytical part of the job. It’s the intellectual part. Supervisors have to be good managers to succeed.
But managing is far from being effective.
Supervisors are bosses. In academia, supervisors have faculty and staff under their purview. And successful managing is not the heart of the skills they need.
But it is heart you need if you truly want to lead.
Leading is four things.
1. MBWA. This is the Hewlett Packard/Tom Peters concept called Managing By Walking Around. It involves the daily (yes, daily) stroll around the offices of some or all of those under you. Not some days; every day. It’s having informal lunches, informal coffee breaks, and spontaneous conversations with those who work for you. It’s saying good morning when they arrive. It’s knowing them, understanding them, recognizing that they have lives, concerns, passions, challenges, successes. Does it look like I’m checking on them, you ask? If you’ve built that sort of relationship, then you’ve got the whole boss thing all wrong.
2. Leadership is them knowing that you have their back. It’s those under you knowing that you are looking out for their best interests. Doesn’t mean everything will go everyone’s way. It’s instilling the confidence in them that they can count on you. How do you do this? Simple. Tell them.
3. It’s sweating the details. Not always delegating
the details. But knowing enough about the details of day-to-day things that you
are able to be aware and connected about many of them. And seeing that they’re
accomplished, or fighting like a pit bull to get them accomplished.
4. Finally, it’s about being the soul of your group. I’m subjectively defining soul here as a strong positive person of intense sensitivity and emotional fervor. You are the core, the encouraging person, the one with an obvious sense of humor, a person who starts even a bad day with an upbeat let’s-move-forward attitude. When was the last time you shared a quotation, a funny story, a YouTube video or a heartfelt accolade? When did you last get your employees a book because you thought it would help them or amuse them? Or even a coffee mug that was just cool?
Most people can be managers without much thought or without much training. Few can be leaders without a lot of thought and conscience.
But every minute of leadership is worth hours of management.
“Great groups need to know that the person at the top will fight like a tiger for them.” --Warren G. Bennis
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