From April.. business-standard.com
Out Of The Box : Manjari Raman
The Yin and Yang of managing
Business Standard, April 18, 2003
Leaders obsess about the long-term, and focus on figuring out how to shape the future so that the company benefits
Leaders lead. Managers manage. That may sound politically incorrect in the era of empowerment, but it is a maxim neither leaders nor managers should forget.
For when they lose sight of that simple rule — leaders begin to focus on hitting financial targets for example, or managers try to wrestle with disruptive change — companies end up being neither led well nor managed well. The result can even be organisational decline and death.
Companies can avoid the dangerous role reversal by visualising leaders as the sole custodians of their competitive advantage. It is his or her responsibility to find ways of sustaining the organisation’s competitiveness deep into the future.
In contrast, the top management team is the protector of the present. Its priority is to maximise current opportunities and minimise visible threats.
Every organisation needs leaders and managers, the Yin and the Yang of management. “That’s critical when companies have to deal with so much unpredictability,’’ says William L. Wellman, vice-president, First Consulting Group, a California-based strategy consulting company.
“Managers can plot a course down a stable, gently flowing river. They base their actions on planning, which works when things are not so turbulent. However, when it comes to navigating through raging rapids, you need someone who has the skills to react instantly and make risky decisions. That’s a leader.”
There is usually a defining moment in a company’s life when its leadership must be separated from its management. However, companies often fail to seize that moment because the task of restructuring roles and responsibilities daunts both leaders and managers. Moreover, the egos of the people who must give up control hamper the process.
It isn’t as impossible as it sounds, though. The process is working smoothly at the San Diego-based American Technology Company (ATC), for instance, which is headed by founder Elwood ‘Woody’ Norris, a highly successful inventor-entrepreneur. Over the years, Woody has accumulated a great deal of wealth from technologies he has developed — like the Transcutaneous Doppler, which evolved into the sonogram.
Woody’s latest invention is nothing less than revolutionary. He has developed HyperSonic Sound (HSS), which allows the user to direct sound so that only someone at a specific spot can hear it. Unlike the sound waves from loudspeakers, which spread in all directions, Woody’s ultrasonic transmitter emits sound like a sharp beam of light from a torch. “We are doing to sound what the bulb did to light.
The ability to focus light gave us headlights, movies, CD players, flashlights,’’ says an excited Norris. “Seventy seven years after the loudspeaker was invented, HSS is the next generation of sound technology.’’
Woody is not an engineer; in fact, he doesn’t even have a college degree. But he knows how to spot a good idea, and put together a team of people to do the science for him. He is using the same philosophy to manage his company.
In February 2003, Norris appointed James Irish as Chief Executive Officer while he remained Chairman and chief spokesman. Irish has more than 20 years of business experience, most of it in marketing and sales. “Woody and I complement each other. He is a visionary leader. I bring classical business experience to the table,’’ says Irish.
ATC needs both. Woody invested millions in building HSS because he believed that the company needed to do that. Irish has to package and sell the technology, and ensure that the company does not sink under a mountain of debt.
Within a week of signing up, Irish told me, he realised he would have to install management systems from scratch. “We lacked clarity of mission. Woody had it clear in his mind — but he was locked in R&D mode,’’ says Irish, who spoke to each of the company’s 30 employees before writing up ATC’s mission statement.
By March, Irish had also restructured the company into six divisions, streamlined task management to match product flows, and instituted cost control measures and human resource policies. “That will prepare us for growth,’’ explains Irish.
Where that growth will come from remains Woody’s responsibility. He has already moved on; he is now pouring all his energies into developing the AirScooter. The prototype can fly at 70 miles per hour at more than 10,000 feet above sea level and will not require a pilot’s license to operate.
An inventor-entrepreneur is an extreme example of leadership, and the launch of a new technology is an exaggerated example of a defining moment. But Woody’s experience highlights the difference in approach between leaders and managers.
Leaders obsess about the long-term, and focus on figuring out how to shape the future so that the company benefits. Managers are fixated by the short-term, and cope with challenges such that the company does not lose.
Companies that recognise the difference between those roles set up systems to ensure that both leaders and managers can perform well. Leaders distance themselves from day-to-day management and instead, funnel time and energy in trying to track down the next big idea.
In the same way, peripheral opportunities do not distract managers, who focus on exploiting the organisation’s core competencies. Unsurprisingly, companies can register stable growth only if leaders and managers balance the two ends of the seesaw.
manjariraman@yahoo.com
(The columnist is a Boston-based management writer) |
