Management is Underrated

The internet loves a conflict.  And for a while there were a lot of infographics floating around on LinkedIn and elsewhere, purporting to explain the stark difference between “leadership” and “management”.  (You can still find them on the Googles.)  Basically they say:

Leadership is [the noblest of callings and highest professional aspiration, involving things like]:

• Having a vision
• Empowering others
• Accepting responsibility
• Taking risks and tolerating failure
• Providing free phones, food, and foosball
• Wearing hoodies
• Rescuing puppies
• etc.

…whereas Management is [all kinds of horrible soul-crushing evil, such as]:

• Short-term thinking
• Sadistic micromanagement
• Pointless meetings
• Taking all the credit
• Office politics
• Ugly cubicles
• Bad lunch
• etc.

But this is both exaggeration and false dichotomy, all wrapped into a perky yet non-nutritious package, like a rancid twinkie.  Sure, management without leadership devolves into bureaucracy.  But leadership without management is charismatic chaos.  You need both – at both the organizational and individual level.  (If you’ve ever worked in a big company with lots of leaders but no good managers, you know what I’m talking about.*)

To put it another way: “management” isn’t just a fancy word for bad leadership.  It’s an actual set of useful skills that too often leaders lack.  These usually fall into a few distinct buckets:

• Communication: How to write clearly and without too many excess redundant unnecessary word-units; how to build a decent slide; how to speak clearly, persuasively, and audibly; how to present without reading your slides verbatim; knowing the difference between “it’s” and “its”; understanding that while “table stakes” and “table steaks” are both good to have, they don’t serve the same business function.

• Financial Literacy: Basic accounting principles; how to read and evaluate financial statements; how to build a realistic budget; how to track and interpret the basic KPIs of your business; how to tell stories about numbers using pictures; understanding the links between strategy, operations, and financial outcomes; how to use excel for things other than making lists; how to stop any conversation cold by mentioning multivariate regression.

• Operational Basics: How to keep track of details; how to plan a project comprehensively and realistically; how to meet deadlines without having to pull an all-nighter the night before; how to be mostly on time for most things; how to carve out time in your day to actually get stuff done (and help others do the same); how to calculate the maximum number of drinks you should have at any given work function (hint: the answer is usually two fewer than you think).

• People Skills: How to run an efficient meeting**; how to evaluate talent and manage performance; how give and receive feedback in a constructive way; how to conduct useful interviews and make more good hires than bad ones; how to negotiate effectively (both inside and outside the company); how to help a team achieve success without having any formal authority; how to collaborate like a boss (in other words, not like a boss) and actually enjoy it.

Ooops, that last bucket came out sounding suspiciously like leadership.  Because of course the line between management and leadership is a blurry one.  These things are complements – not opposites.  The technical and interpersonal skills that make you an effective manager continue to support you as you take on broader leadership roles.

Of course, management skills alone are no guarantee of future success.  Visions and hoodies matter too.  But our culture reveres leadership and innovation with an adoration that just doesn’t extend to gantt charts and pivot tables – tools used by “mere managers”.  And yet it takes a multitude of capable managers working behind the scenes to keep big business ticking along and paying for all that free cafeteria food.

Remember: if the management-to-leadership ratio drops too low, things can get ugly pretty quickly – especially in a big organization.  So if you happen to find yourself working in a company that is not in a perpetual state of chaos, where performance is consistently healthy and people seem generally happy, be sure to thank a manager.

(Whenever you’re done rescuing puppies.  We’ll wait.)

-Tim P.

* If you and I have ever worked together in the same company, I’m talking about other companies.  Not that one.

** If you’ve ever been in a meeting with me, you recognize the irony.  “Do as I say, not as I do.”