Another Face of Janus (The Nature of Leadership and Its Relation to Management). I. A Critique of the Prevalent Approaches

Leadership is not a function of management. Leader qualities constitute an integral part of the arsenal of many non-managers, while a good deal of managers do not evince such abilities when carrying out their everyday duties. Nor are leaders alter egos of managers, the former deciding what the right things are and the latter doing the things rightly. The setting of goals as an inseparable component of the planning is a primary task of managers. Those not determining what must be done are barely ordinary performers. The reverse of the same coin is the portrayal of managers as formal leaders differing from “wonted” ones only in that they are endowed with certain official power over the staff. But without formal regulation of rights and duties, no complex order can be established, and organization gets deprived of its hierarchical structure and transmutes into a primitive association. So, no one of the prevailing approaches provides some distinct comprehension of the nature of leadership. That is why it gets urgent to suggest a fresh theoretical perspective capable of representing both leadership and management within a single framework and showing them as different but kindred means of influencing people.

Keywords:

Keywords: leadership, management, faces of Janus, prevalent doctrines, critique.