Is every manager a leader? And does every leader have to be a manager? You decide, as we break down the differences between leadership vs. management.

We often use the words “management” and “leadership” as synonyms. We tend to think that top executives are leaders by default, and, likewise, we usually think that those in the middle of the organizational structure are managers.

These beliefs are pretty deeply rooted. But look at the concepts of leadership and management under the microscope, and you’ll find that this picture doesn’t really pass muster.

Leadership and management are fundamentally different concepts. The difference consists primarily in their function: leaders and managers both want their teams to succeed – but they think about the path to success in different ways.

They’re like two separate lines, each adding something unique to the picture. These lines overlap at some points, but they never completely blur into one. Let`s try to understand, why?

What is leadership?

Leadership is a process of social influence, which maximizes the efforts of others, towards the achievement of a goal. Leaders focus on the big picture. They create and communicate vision, and empower others to carry it out. In other words, they set a direction, help people understand it, and create conditions for them to act and make things happen. Leadership is about change for the better, and a leader is someone who can help others make that change possible and benefit from it.

Experts say there isn’t any set of qualities that every leader possesses. They explain the phenomenon of leadership through one criterion:

“A leader is someone who has followers, plain and simple. The only determinant of whether anyone is leading is whether anyone else is following.”

To have a crowd of followers, a leader must be passionate. He or she must deeply believe in something and get others inspired. Only if the leader’s faith and passion are strong, people will be willing to invest their energy into reaching the goals.

Leadership is not necessarily tied to a certain position in the company hierarchy. It has nothing to do with a title or job description. If you’re at the top, it means you’re a senior executive – but not necessarily a leader. You may be both…but that’s not guaranteed.

What is management?

Management concerns the coordination and administration of tasks. It is a process of coordinating the efforts of employees to accomplish the objectives, using available resources. Management is about efficiency and effectiveness. It is about completing tasks within specific timelines, problem-solving, and bringing results.

Managers work closely with their teams and provide guidance. They set goals and give positive and negative feedback – the best of them do it immediately, in a one-minute fashion, not waiting till there are too many appraisals and reprimands to take care of.

The difference between leaders and managers

In a way, the question “Are all manager’s leaders?” sounds a bit like “Are all fruits apples?”

A manager can be a leader, but this is not necessarily a given. Their focus may be more granular, procedural – more focused on tactical processes and on the nuts and bolts of how things get done.

Likewise, a leader can be a manager. But it can also be anyone else on the team, if they step into that role.

Both leaders and managers make a valuable contribution to an organization – but this contribution is different. Leaders advocate change and new approaches, looking for new ideas. Managers focus on stability and maintain the status quo. Leaders see a forest, and managers see the individual trees.

Leaders are visionaries. They analyse the current state their organization is in as related to other organizations, and create a vision of the future, developing a strategy for getting there. They communicate their strategic vision to people, and make the picture of the future desirable for them. Leaders discover and communicate the why – because only when people know why they do something; they will be truly passionate about it.

A manager’s role, however, involves working with an organization as a system to make it function effectively. Managers control all the processes and make sure that a good or a process is produced on time and within a budget. They focus on how things need to be done and when.

This way, while leaders are future-oriented, creating an image of future success, managers focus on the present, working on implementing processes here and now. A leader challenges employees, and a manager accepts a status quo.

As we can see, the roles of leaders and managers are correlated: a leader creates a company’s vision, and a manager transforms that vision into reality.