Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Thanks Miles, I am glad you gave me a post to respond to.

"I don't like to be managed. But if you lead me, I'll follow you anywhere." In all fairness, management usually is the red headed step child of leadership. Throughout this class we have effectively squashed management in favor of leadership in almost every situation. We have painted management in a cold, aggressive, impotent spotlight. Management is what bad leaders do. I am here to resurrect management. Yes, I agree that an individual leads people while an individual usually manages tasks. Fair enough. But a leader who cannot manage is ineffective. A true leader knows how to manage effectively while leading. Management focuses on work. We manage activities such as money, time, paperwork, materials, equipment, etc. Management is how “stuff gets done.” Effective Leadership, in any capacity provides vision, direction, modeling, and motivation. But if you stay there without taking the strategic plan to implement vision, you might as well have never communicated vision in the first place. It's vital for individuals in positions of great responsibility to be able to play both roles: the pastor who cannot manage will kill a church just as fast as one who cannot lead. “But the person who can do both, they are on the path to success.” The goal of leadership should not be to avoid management to utilize management for productivity. Again, balance between vision casting and management is essential to a successful church. Churches need to be led, but they also need to be managed.

2 comments:

  1. Management is focusing on work, and leadership is focused on people, or this seems like a sound implied summary of your points.
    You are right that vision alone does little. Imagination, and an ability to dream of better days for people are great but if we can’t bring those things into a shared reality, we are simply daydreamers; the same thing so many of us got in trouble for in middle school. So management is as important as the vision itself. I suggest that management need not come from the same person that holds/casts the vision, but that person must at least be able to identify the person with whom they can work WITH, (not pass off to) to bring that vision to reality.
    I’m not a natural administrator/manager, and have worked very hard to develop those skills. When taking over a ministry at my church I immediately, and subconsciously felt that success would come from great and detailed planning. My pastor quickly saw this and encouraged me back to my strengths, encouraging me to “pastor” the people I lead, not simply plan events. In this case pastoring is leading. He also pointed out that the difference between a philosopher and a revolutionary is in implementation. Implementation is successful management.

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  2. If I may chime in? I have owned and operated a business for nearly twenty years, and without management, I would not have made it past the first six months. Management should not be looked upon as a dark disfigured part of doing business or leading a church. In my opinion, proper management is the backbone of good leadership. Casting the vision is the essential first step, managing is the required maintenance (if you will) of accomplishing the vision. I do not believe that anyone can be an effective leader without being a manager as well. How else will you gage, encourage, hold accountable and lead without it?

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