I’ve always believed there’s a crucial difference between Leaders and Managers.

Leaders lead.

Managers manage.

I know. That’s quite a revelation, right? But, all sarcasm aside, you’d be surprised how many leaders I’ve met over the years who don’t understand that distinction.

Photograph of a pay telescope looking at a sunset

One of my clients wasn’t one of them. Ironically, his managers were. When my client walked into a meeting one day and told his managers that he didn’t know how to do their jobs, a dozen jaws spontaneously hit the conference table like in one of those old Looney Tunes cartoons when Bugs Bunny dresses up like Little Red Riding Hood and walks into a nightclub full of wolves. Minds were blown. They just couldn’t wrap their heads around it.

Why? Because most of his managers were so old-school they still believed that the only way to do your job well is to be able to do everyone else’s job too, and if your leader doesn’t know how to do your job and has the temerity to stand in front of you and admit it out loud, surely that means they’re not qualified to be a leader at all?

If it was a Looney Tunes cartoon, this would have been the moment when Bugs nervously steps out of his Little Red Riding Hood disguise, says “That’s all, folks!” and bolts for the exit. Fortunately, my client wasn’t like that. He’d already anticipated the response he was going to get and so, for the rest of that meeting, he gave his managers a crash course on why it’s a leader’s responsibility to stay focused on the bigger picture and trust everyone else below them to get on with their jobs.

Just like his managers needed to trust the team members beneath them to get on with their jobs and so on and so on, all the way down the chain.

It’s a simple formula.

[Believe in the abilities of your people] + {trust they know how to do their own jobs better than you.}

For a leader, that means bringing your A players together, making sure they’re pointed in the right direction, and then trusting them to deliver their results without constantly looking over their shoulder to check they’re holding their map the right way up.

Because, if you’re leading correctly, the people you’ve employed should always be better at their jobs than you.

It’s not a leader’s responsibility to know how to do their manager’s jobs, just like it’s not a manager’s responsibility to know how to do their team member’s jobs. Instead, it’s a manager’s responsibility to facilitate their team and make sure they have all the tools they need to do their jobs well, and it’s the leader’s responsibility to stay focused on the bigger picture and have an unobstructed view of the wider industry they’re a part of. When they do that, the business will run more smoothly, they’ll stay on top of the industry news, trends and innovations, and they’ll be supporting their managers and everyone else in the organisation by keeping the business successful and staying ahead of the competition.

A small disclaimer.

Having said that, I do believe that everyone at the top of a business should know exactly what’s going on in all the other areas of the business because, if they don’t, they’ll be operating in a vacuum. That can be potentially fatal for a whole bunch of reasons, including:

When you operate in a vacuum, how can you be sure that you and your staff are on track with your work and what you’re doing is correct.
Operating in a vacuum makes you question your value, impacts productivity, and is an overall morale killer.

But knowing exactly what’s going on in the business isn’t the same as knowing how to do everyone else’s job. It’s being united with the leader’s vision, so everyone can do their jobs better.

As a leader, what’s your vision?

It’s staying focused on the bigger picture and trusting everyone else to get on with their jobs.

See how joined-up that thinking is? That’s why, when my client finished his ‘leaders vs managers’ crash-course presentation, it was no longer like a Looney Tunes cartoon at all. Instead, it was like that scene in The Lion King when they hold the cub over the edge of the cliff so that all the other animals can see it (which is completely irresponsible if you ask me, the RSPCA should have been all over that one) and everyone sings The Circle of Life.

You’re a leader. Stay focused on the bigger picture.