Leadership Vs. Management: The Difference Between Leadership And Management

As John M. Bryson explains, we engage in strategic planning “… in the United States and elsewhere … to help public and nonprofit organizations create public value” (kindle file). Bryson furthermore explains, “ creating public value means producing enterprises, policies, programs, projects, services, or physical, technological, social, political, and cultural infrastructure that advance the public interest and the common good at a reasonable cost” (kindle file).

It seems leadership and management are used often in articles or conversations to mean the “same” style or same individual when using leader versus manager. However, there are just as many articles or conversations where there is a drastic difference between the two. I believe it could be seen as confusing because many individuals use both styles. The individual has to observe his or her followers, realize the work environment and have a clear understanding of the vision for the goal. Nevertheless, there are individuals who do

Good managers do those things both effectively and efficiently" (Bateman & Snell, 2004). The management style is simply assigning tasks and then receiving the results. Management then gets it authority by being given the position in the business or organization.

Van Wart stated (as cited in Zaleznik, 1977; Bennis and Nanus, 1985: Kotter, 1990, “… leadership is about producing change and movement and thus focuses on vision, strategizing, aligning people, and inspiring, and that management is about order and consistency, and thus emphasizes planning, organizing, controlling, staffing and budgeting” (p.32). As John M. Bryson explains, “Leaders should be especially attentive to the possibilities for rather dramatic strategic change. Pressures and come from the political context,…economic context,…technological context…or ecological context” (kindle file).

As Sherri Hartzell