Leadership and Management

Leadership and Management

In today's work field successful leaders and managers are a hot commodity. Mangers and leaders that are able to bring success to their organization are often given an enormous amount of respect from their workers and their peers. In this Paper I will discuss the principles of management and leaders and how they compare and contrast one another in a working environment.

Effective leaders are not necessarily born but rather sculptured from the images that are experienced through various leaders that the individual may have worked with. They are sculptured through the trials and tribulations of managing or working with people in a variety of settings. Most good leaders have had bad experiences with individuals with power in their past and are looking to make a change to better improve their organization. Effective leaders are excellent communicators and are able to speak clearly to the individuals within the groups or organizations they lead. Effective leaders are often working with their fellow workers carefully listening and helping their workers in order to have success in their future for their business. Leaders offer their workers the opportunities to override their mistakes by triumphantly overcoming them. Leaders have solid vision and unshakeable persistence in achieving a goal. Leaders have to juggle their busy schedules by not only doing their work but ensuring that their workers are successfully completing their tasks as well. A leader empowers their workers to seek change and develop many alterative routes to decisions. A strong leader is brave and is able to make decisions without hesitation and maintains integrity at all times. A strong leader overall has these important characteristics which Marines like to call JJ DID TIE BUCKLE, Judgment, Justice, De

Project managers are leaders of small and large groups destined to complete a strategic project plan. Leadership characteristics described above can make or break a team. In all successful project fulfillments, it is the leadership of the project manager that determines the type of success for the project's members. The most successful accomplishments are met with a sense of fun and reward when goals and objectives are met, all facilitated by the project manager's leadership. "Persistent leadership is required to make partnering work. Project managers must "walk the talk" and consistently display a collaborative response to problems. Similarly, top management must consistently and visibly champion the principles of openness, trust, and teamwork." (Gray and Larson, 2001, p. 373)

There is also an emerging element in project management. It was first introduced by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi in his book Flow Ð'- The Psychology of Optimal Experience. (Harper and Row, 1990). He states that, "Instead of accepting the unity of purpose provided by genetic instructions or by the rules of society, the challenge for us is to create harmony based on reason and choice." This reason and choice are the foundations of project management. People are more productive when they have optimal experience, a sense of flow to their personal and professional lives. Mr. Csikszentmihalyi describes flow as "being completely involved in an activity for its own sake. The ego falls away. Time flies. Every action, movement, and thought follows inevitably from the previous one, like playing jazz. Your whole being is involved, and you're using your skills to the utmost." This is the foundation for the highest productivity in any organization.

Project managers of today are successful due to their interpersonal relationships with everyone associated with the project. Providing an environment noted by Gray and Larson means that to incorporate the concepts and a delivery mechanism of optimal performance, Flow has to be incorporated within the foundation of the strategic plan. The attention given to this process empowers the leadership skills of each member of the team. Empowered leaders facilitate action and results, often better than anticipated.

Leadership styles that are successful in one industry may not garner the same results in another. The integrity of James Burke, CEO of Johnson & Johnson, led the company out of a potential disaster when Tylenol's tampering took place. Instead of following the recommendations of both the FBI and the Food and Drug Association, they recalled the entire supply on the market, even replacing customers' capsule bottles with tablets. On the other hand, had he been faced with the knowledge that fossil fuel use is polluting air, ground, and waters of the world, would he have recalled the oil?

Realistically, CEOs management styles are often tailored to their particular industry. Defense contractors have traditionally been lead by job threat