The difference between leaders and managers (guest column by Captrench)

The difference between leaders and managers, in the business world and the game world, as reported from a man who knows the trenches - Captrench from the TSW Forums.  (Original post here).  This post is entirely his/her work.

"This is actually a topic that for the past two years has never been far from my mind. Although I've led teams in the past, I've started accumulating more "senior" type responsibilities, in a much more formal and structured sense than before. 

I've started appreciating the difference in skill and effort required between getting the best out of a team of like minded individuals, and a team of those who are not. Its easy to say "See? Simples!" when your team is full of "can do" people with work ethics you relate with and understand.

But that's a bit obvious and self serving. You haven't had to show any skill or effort yourself, because the team is low maintenance and motivated already. The challenge, and skill/effort, is for when your team or individual members is much less than ideal.

To me, there are two generic skills that often get mixed together and used interchangeably, despite being very different and distinct. And that becoming aware of these made it easier for me to appreciate my own bosses/managers, their strengths and weaknesses. Which in turn, now, also helps me to known my own. These are, Management and Leadership. Each is distinct, but each on its own in isolation can lead to extreme scenarios best avoided.

Roughly, Management is the ability to prioritise and organise work needed with the resources needed to accomplish it, to maximise resource expense with result gained.

Leadership is the ability to inspire and generate the desired behaviours, and enforce the ethics of, the relevant role. The leadership shown by and required of say, a bereavement counsellor, to their team of social workers might be very different than that required of the leader of a squadron of soldiers under enemy fire.

That's enemy "fire"... literally.
(From Funcom's media library)

As a technician, I find I'm a better "leader", than I am a manager. And as a senior within my field, that is the lions share of what is required of me. I need to set the correct example of behaviour and ethics, mentor those junior to me, nurture confidence, technical knowledge. I try to teach (passionately) that accountability is much more important than pure technical excellence, and ensure that mistakes admitted to are not a rod to be beaten with. My favourite adage is "Experience, unfortunately, is a greater teacher than foresight". We will all make mistakes.

I'm also very emphatic about asking questions, and the importance of repeating the question until you understand what's required. I don't remember anything until I've been through it myself, and struggled through all the usual gotchas. So I don't expect anyone I mentor to be a memory master of what's now intuitive to me. Asking is smart, breaking systems because you didn't ask (again) is dumb. If its me you will ask... ask, ask and ask again. I don't care.

I'm very passionate about ethics, principles and the "right" thing to do, both personally and professionally. But its also a huge overhead. It can take huge emotional, effort and time investment. Dogmatically sticking to principles at all costs can cause unnecessary friction, and limit progress, which professionally is really short sighted, and career limiting. This is where Management comes in.

My passion for moral principles and professional ethics is an overhead, which I'm happy to pay, but it can cause problems when I have to "manage" difficult situations/personalities. Developing a "manager head", I have to remember that how I have to handle a situation may differ very much from my emotional response to it. How I present an idea to people needs to cater to the audience, not a simplistic "Follow me!".

When a flood of emotions rushes you, you cant efficiently erect a dam to block them, you have to channel them constructively. Easier said than done, for me. But over the last few years I've started appreciating that I need to be a little more sophisticated in my responses. The "right" thing to do in principle may not be achieved simply by insisting its so.

Whether in social groups, such as Guilds, or business, I appreciate leaders and managers (especially people who can be both) much more now. I've had managers with no leadership skills, and vice versa and each comes with its issues. Also, not all roles require both specifically, so it may be perfectly acceptable to have pure management or leader roles.

Principles are often horizons we aim for. How we get to them is rarely a straight line. Insisting on the straight line will have you crash into every wave and landmass along the way. Management of the journey is how make that journey as efficient and painless as possible, whilst still aiming for the principle."