Leader vs. Manager vs. Executive … one of these 3 terms does not belong here.

Which one? Leader! In business, leadership is a trait of a manager useful to exert formal authority in interacting with others. It is also a trait of the informal leaders, people that are managers of expertise.

Leadership is a concept to be discussed alone. There is no logical comparison between management and leadership because they are not opposite, but intertwined.

A manager is an administrator of people or knowledge. He takes care of people and the work environment and takes decision that must benefit those two. As long as a manager does not understand that he is not a boss with discretionary powers, he remains a stupid person, doing stupid things and abusing people.

An executive is a person that does things; he makes things happen by acting. From a Chief Executive Officer (CEO) to an Account Executive, they are all people that execute action in order to reach organization’s objectives.

All the responsibilities in a job description can be grouped using the above two characteristics: administrator (manager) and executive (“action man”). When one takes precedence, it gives the name to that job: manager of “something” or a description of the main action that the respective employee must perform.

If we are to better define the manager component, we have to analyze it in comparison with the executive component of a job.

If we are to better define and understand leadership, we have to analyze its formal and informal components, the types of manifestation, and the followership trait (inside and outside the company).

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For an employee the company is supposed to be a family, a place in which you feel good, this being the main motivation and not the money. How about we treat this as a business for both sides? It is always about money. If next to money comes a pleasant social interaction and higher purposes … is fine.

When you negotiate your salary, the employer will try to pay you the smallest amount possible. The funny part is that if you tell the interviewer that you are there for the money, they will put you at the end of the list. So you lie and the carousel starts: they will think they tricked you and expect performance, you will be unsatisfied and will do work in … the smallest amount possible.
Everybody loses.

It should be a fair trade. You give your time and your competencies and you ask in return what you need and not what is offered.

Remember: You are part of the negotiation process and not the subject of negotiation. Personal branding should become your favorite jacket. The more you know about yourself, the more conscious you become of your value on the labor market.

Everything that is said about organizational behavior must respect the fair trade principles.

• Transparency and accountability
• Payment of fair price
• Gender equity
• Decent work environment
• Trade relations

We are so used to having freedom of speech but we do not care about our freedom to act. No matter the country, although the employer asks more work and dedication from you every day … he loves you until you ask for a raise.

Long-term relationships are based on solidarity, trust and mutual respect. You as an employee are the customer that buys-in the need for profit of the company every day. The organization should buy in exchange your need: the need for money.

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• How do we grow our revenues?
• How can we manage costs better in the future?
• How can we retain our customers?

Beep!!! Too late! You should have answered this question yesterday!

While your manager uses the words business development strategy even to decide how many rolls of toilet paper will be bought next month, nothing really gets done. He never thinks ahead more than 2 years time. After that period or sooner he will be working for the competition bragging about his contribution to your strategy.

Strategy is not just a buzz word.  The same goes for business intelligence strategy. It is everything you do every minute except when you stay still. As an organization you must invest in people that define, plan, implement and review and let this attitude be your organizational culture.

Do not hire somebody that tells you: “I know where I am going and how to get there.” Find somebody that does it already.

One or other is better. You can not have one without the other. A lot of talk on this subject. I am convinced that we need even more. There is gold in the research data and there are diamonds in the experience of seasoned executives.

Without saying anything new: a leader is the one that influences the actions of others around him in the direction of achieving the goal of an organization.

What seems to get put aside often is the fact that a leader needs followers. We will talk about Leadership but we will have to talk about Followership also.

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What is good to know in business is that a sell rep is human. And greed is human too. He will pay more attention to get deals done NOW.  He will offer discounts “just this time” every time.

What is vital to know in business is if this type of sell rep works for you.

Cohesiveness is a characteristic of team that reflects no so much the unity of the group as it reflects the resistance to leave it.

The survival instinct, even suppressed by social norms, will still make you less efficient if you do not like your work environment and the people you work with (social loafing – next post).

A clue about the fact that a team member feels that he/she is part of the team is the fact that in conversation it is used “we” instead of “I”.

The forces that keep team members together are:

• Positive – rewards
• Negative – what you loose if you leave

Factors that influence cohesiveness are:

• Similarity of team members in gender, age, values, etc.
• Success and the professionalism of every employee – when tasks are accomplished things go better for the team
• External threats of competition – people as specie react well to danger of any kind and work better together in putting out the fire.

The visible results of a high cohesiveness in a team are an increase motivation for participating in the team activities but also the possibility to better impose on the “black sheep” the social norms agreed by the team. With conformity comes less individuality and more success as a team.

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I have learned in time to treat a company as a living organism that is always sick. Rarely did I see a company that was healthy. And once in a blue moon I got a chance to exchange a few words with it.

Why? Because it was moving so fast!

A healthy business organizational structure accepts only change and business innovation as normality. This acceptance is called organizational development.

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Did you know that employees are not mindless robots, a resource that you can dispose of and quantify in a turnover rate statistics?

Of course you knew!

If you are an employer, you will tell it to the world … and do nothing about it.

… while there is nothing wrong with capitalism, there is something definitely mistaken if you do not understand that you lose money when your employees are not treated as your best clients. After all, they buy every day the worst merchandise there is: your desire of getting rich.

If you are an employee, you will tell it to your friends as an externalization of your frustrations at work.

… if you are not just hunting for a warm place to stay and get paid, you better stop complaining and start negotiating. Do not assume that you deserve anything. But be certain that you can negotiate anything.

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