This article is about your responsibilities as your unit’s leader. Too many new managers assume that they don’t have to worry about leadership, because they think that term is only used in talking about CEOs and presidents. Not so. If you’re responsible for the performance of a group, then you’re both a manager and a leader.
That you are a manager means that you already have achieved a certain level of professionalism in your field. To continue to succeed as a manager and beyond, you must begin to develop your leadership potential. You don’t have a choice in this matter. You’re a leader because that’s what the people who work for you expect you to be. They look to you for purpose and direction.
As a manager, you handle things like scheduling problems and how to allocate resources to the work. Your planning perspective is tactical (see Planning). As a leader, you will be concerned with your unit’s purpose and its direction. You also will build a sense of teamwork within your unit. The Oxford English Dictionary defines a manager as “a person controlling or administering a business” and a leader as “a person who causes others to go with him, by guiding and showing the way; guides by persuasion and argument.”
There is much interest today in this thing called leadership. In dynamic environments, where change is rapid and there are few points of reference, leader- ship is needed.