Management is concerned with metrics; leadership is focused on mindsets. Management looks for best practice; leadership operates according to big principles.
Managers build structures, but leaders create cultures. Leaders are cultural architects who, by articulating vision, mapping strategy and marshaling activity, create a safe and exciting space in which people flourish and projects fly.
Tough economic times require leadership that is both visionary & visible.
In the light of abuses to the expenses system, it would be easy for parliamentarians - and especially those who lead the major parties - to try to become micro or nano-managers.
Accountability is vital, of course, and there may yet be more revelations to come. Yet we need more than administrators who can tell us how much has been taken, or how to develop better systems for accountability.
We need leaders who will create a totally new governmental culture in this country, one which is based on moral principles, conviction and transparency rather than mere pragmatism, expediency and spin.
This is not only true in the narrow area of parliamentary expenses. We need leaders who can articulate where we are headed as a society.
True leaders always provide the power of context for the community as a whole. They offer a big-picture narrative into which we can plug our lives, individually and collectively. This story helps define who we are and why we count as a nation - which is especially important as globalism gathers pace, leaving us hungrier than ever to discover a sense of "tribe".Sadly, in the coming European and local elections we are likely to see groups like UKIP and the BNP gaining support by default - simply because they're able to clearly articulate a group vision for the nation as they'd like it to be.
At present, the business of government in this country appears to be more about building systems and setting performance targets for this and that, rather than offering sightlines to a better tomorrow.
Without visionary leadership, administration simply devises more and more complex systems to take us absolutely nowhere! We need fewer "government circles" and many more "lines of sight" - we need more leadership to provide the parameters for management.
About Mal Fletcher:
Mal Fletcher is an author, business and media consultant, media commentator, global conference speaker and broadcaster based in London.
He has pioneered several major leadership networks and is the chairman of 2020 Plus, a London-based leadership and communications consultancy which is helping business, media and community groups to proactively engage future change, especially in difficult times.
Mal hosts the annual Strategic Leadership Consultation, which he founded in 1998, and was the founding National Director of Youth Alive Australia, a large, nationwide organisation teaching positive values to young people and running drug and alcohol-free events.
Follow Mal on Twitter www.twitter.com/malfletcher or go to www.2020Plus.org for more information. Copyright Mal Fletcher 2009
