Today's ICMA Smart Brief featured a lead headline on saying "bosses should be both leaders and managers."  The "snippet" contained in the Smart Brief contained a link to the Thought Leaders blog at  http://www.thoughtleadersllc.com/2012/09/how-to-find-balance-between-leadership-and-management/

This is a topic that all of us should understand as managers of local government organizations and that is the difference between "leadership" and "management" and recognizing that both are needed in the effective running of an organization. 

Reading this blog led me to remember what I liked so much about High Performance Organization strategies and everything that I learned through hearing the CCHPO work over and over again.  (The Commonwealth Centers for High Performance Organizations has been recognized as a leading practice provider by ICMA for its HPO theory.)

While it isn't always easy to be a manager, it is a topic on which we get lots of training.  And, we are typically problem solvers, working effectively toward a solution for everything, so the management work just comes a little easier to us and is something that we quickly jump to in our work.

However, we have to make time to do the work of leadership in our organizations.  Stephen Covey has said that leadership (or Quadrant 2) work is often the last type of work we get to in our busy work days.  Why is that?  Are we too busy, too consumed with being a manager that we don't look at the important work of leadership as being critical to our roles as local government managers?

Do we also fail to recognize that leadership is not positional?  In other words, do we see the police officer on the street or the public works employee who cuts grass in the parks or maintains the streets as  leaders?  If not, why not? They are the ones that come into contact every day with the customers and stakeholders of our communities.  They also are the ones that often know best how to solve problems or improve processes in our organizations.

My exposure to High Performance Organization strategies really helped me to understand not only the difference between leadership and management, but the fact that leadership can, and should occur, every where in the organization.  To me, it is common sense, but it took me to learn the concepts of HPO before I really knew it was ok.

If you are one of those great managers out there who isn't taking time to do the important leadership work in your organization or don't see your employees as your greatest helpers in this work, rethink how you are approaching your job.  It will make a world of difference for you and for your organization!!