Leadership vs Management

management and leadership

Or is it Leadership *and* Management?

 

Tom Geraghty
Speaking at CIO Event in London, 2019

I created this graphic in 2019 as part of a presentation on High Performing Teams for the IT Leaders Conference.

management and leadership

Inspired by Grace Hopper’s “You manage things, you lead people” quote, I wanted to make the point that great leadership also requires great management skills. You can be a great manager of things without leadership skills, but you can’t be a great leader without good management skills. Without those management skills, you may be able to lead people, but your lack of direction, effectiveness, and capability could lead to failure.

You manage things, you lead people" quote by grace hopper

Sometimes management and leadership are presented as a binary, or worse, that “management” is bad and “leadership” is good. Neither is true: we should resist “leaderism“, and instead concentrate on the actual capabilities and skills required to manage things, and lead people. Both can be learned, taught, and always improved. We dive into this much deeper over at psychsafety.com, where we examine the capabilities and skills required for both excellent management and leadership.

tom geraghty psychological safety

(Since 2019, this graphic has gone a bit viral on LinkedIn, Chegg, Twitter and elsewhere!)

The fabulous Elita Silva translated the management and leadership graphic into Portuguese!

management and leadership - Portuguese

 

And the fabulous Ana Aneiros Vivas has translated it into Spanish!

Spanish-version-of-Management-and-leadership

Filippo Poletti translated it into Italian!

management and leadership in Italian

 

And the folk at Solutions and Performances – Executive Search have translated it into French!

Remote Working – What Have We Learned From 2020?

Remote working improves productivity.

Even way back in 2014, evidence showed that remote working enables employees to be more productive and take fewer sick days, and saves money for the organisation.  The rabbit is out of the hat: remote working works, and it has obvious benefits.

Source: Forbes Global Workplace Analytics 2020

More and more organisations are adopting remote-first or fully remote practices, such as Zapier:

“It’s a better way to work. It allows us to hire smart people no matter where in the world, and it gives those people hours back in their day to spend with friends and family. We save money on office space and all the hassles that comes with that. A lot of people are more productive in remote setting, though it does require some more discipline too.”

We know, through empirical studies and longitudinal evidence such as Google’s Project Aristotle that colocation of teams is not a factor in driving performance. Remote teams perform as well as, if not better than colocated teams, if provided with appropriate tools and leadership.

Teams that are already used to more flexible, lightweight or agile approaches adapt adapt to a high performing and fully remote model even more easily than traditional teams.

The opportunity to work remotely, more flexibly, and save on time spent commuting helps to improve the lives of people with caring, parenting or other commitments too. Whilst some parents are undoubtedly keen to get into the office and away from the distractions of home schooling, the ability to choose remote and more flexible work patterns is a game changer for some, and many are actually considering refusing to go back to the old ways.

What works for some, doesn’t work for others, and it will change for all of us over time, as our circumstances change. But having that choice is critical.

However, remote working is still (even now in 2020 with the effects of Covid and lockdowns) something that is “allowed” by an organisation and provided to the people that work there as a benefit.

Remote working is now an expectation.

What we are seeing now is that, for employees at least, particularly in technology, design, and other knowledge-economy roles, remote working is no longer a treat, or benefit – just like holiday pay and lunch breaks,  it’s an expectation.

Organisations that adopt and encourage remote working are able to recruit across a wider catchment area, unimpeded by geography, though still somewhat limited by timezones – because we also know that synchronous communication is important.

Remote work is also good for the economy, and for equality across geographies. Remote work is closing the wage gap between areas of the US and will likely have the same effect on the North-South divide in the UK. This means London firms can recruit top talent outside the South-East, and people in typically less affluent areas can find well paying work without moving away.

But that view isn’t shared by many organisations.

However, whilst employees are increasingly seeing remote working as an expectation rather than a benefit, many organisations, via pressure from command-control managers, difficulties in onboarding, process-oriented HR teams, or simply the most dangerous phrase in the English language: because “we’ve always done it this way“, possess a desire to bring employees back into the office, where they can see them.

Indeed, often by the managers of that organisation, remote working may be seen as an exclusive benefit and an opportunity to slack off. The Taylorist approach to management is still going strong, it appears.

People are adopting remote faster than organisations.

In 1962, Everett Rogers came up with the principle he called “Diffusion of innovation“.

It describes the adoption of new ideas and products over time as a bell curve, and categorises groups of people along its length as innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority, and laggards. Spawned in the days of rapidly advancing agricultural technology, it was easy (and interesting) to study the adoption of new technologies such as hybrid seeds, equipment and methods.

Some organisations are even suggesting that remote workers could be paid less, since they no longer pay for their commute (in terms of costs and in time), but I believe the converse may become true – that firms who request regular attendance at the office will need to pay more to make up for it. As an employee, how much do you value your free time?

It seems that many people are further along Rogers’ adoption curve than the organisations they work for.

There are benefits of being in the office.

Of course, it’s important to recognise that there are benefits of being colocated in an office environment. Some types of work simply don’t suit it. Some people don’t have a suitable home environment to work from. Sometimes people need to work on a physical product or collaborate and use tools and equipment in person. Much of the time, people just want to be in the same room as their colleagues – what Tom Cheesewright calls “The unbeatable bandwidth of being there.”

But is that benefit worth the cost? An average commute is 59 minutes, which totals nearly 40 hours per month, per employee. For a team of twenty people, is 800 hours per month worth the benefit of being colocated? What would you pay to obtain an extra 800 hours of time for your team in a single month?

The question is one of motivation: are we empowering our team members to choose where they want to work and how they best provide value, or are we to revert to the Taylorist principles where “the manager knows best”? In Taylors words: “All we want of them is to obey the orders we give them, do what we say, and do it quick.

We must use this as a learning opportunity.

Whilst 2020 has been a massive challenge for all of us, it’s also taught us a great deal, about change, about people and about the future of work. The worst thing that companies can do is ignore what they have learned about their workforce and how they like to operate. We must not mindlessly drift back to the old ways.

We know that remote working is more productive, but there are many shades of remoteness, and it takes strong leadership, management effort, good tools, and effective, high-cadence communication to really do it well.

There is no need for a binary choice: there is no one-size-fits-all for office-based or remote work. There are infinite operating models available to us, and the best we can do to prepare for the future of work is simply to be endlessly adaptable.

Going solo

This is the view from where I’m living now.

I’ll explain. A couple of months ago, my partner was offered a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to live and work in Andalusia, doing digital marketing for an organisation that is part retreat centre, part permaculture farm, and part yoga teacher training school. With brexit looming and faced with such a great opportunity to do something very different, we both rapidly left our jobs in the UK, packed up what stuff we didn’t get rid of or put in storage, and moved.

All of which means I’m now working with the organisations here (suryalila.comdanyadara.com and froglotusyogainternational.com ) alongside developing my own consultancy business and working as CTO for ydentity.com (so new we still have lorem ipsum text). I will freely admit that coming off the salary drug is a tough task, but having the freedom to do my own thing, develop my skills and work the hours that I want is proving very satisfying so far.

For the moment, I’m getting involved in a really wide range of work, from project management, tech consultancy, AWS engineering, to digital marketing and analytics, security consultancy and more. The reason for me getting stuck into such a wide range of tasks is so I can really work on evaluating what the most suitable area is for me to focus on in the future, both from a perspective of what I’m good at and enjoy doing, and also what I find there is most demand for in the marketplace.

If you would like to work with me or you’d like to discuss an opportunity for us to collaborate, drop me a line through LinkedIn, email me at tom@tomgeraghty.co.uk or pop in to see me in Andalusia, if you can get past the goats on the highway.

Embrace the silence

When i am silent, i have thunder hidden inside me.

Over the years in my career so far, I’ve found that in some (many) situations, my speaking style in meetings doesn’t always “work” effectively.

Some background: when I was young, I was diagnosed with dyspraxia, and had trouble forming sentences and speaking properly. I had speech therapy until the age of around 8 years old. The word “hammer” was a particular challenge for me, apparently. I don’t know why. I can say hammer really well now. Try me.

As a result of this (or maybe it’s just coincidental), I often pause before speaking, particularly when in a larger group, or in a situation where what I say really matters. It’s partly to formulate the content, the idea, the concept, but also to establish the “how” of it; i.e. how to structure the sentences, what phrasing to use, and how the statement is to be delivered.

Now, this pause is useful for everyone. It allows for a more cogent, relevant and useful discussion.

But, people seem to feel the need to fill this audible space. Whether that’s a result of a discomfort with silence, or a desire to be the one speaking and presenting their ideas instead of me, I don’t know. I suspect both, in different scenarios. I don’t really care though, as it gives me more time to build my response anyway.

I guess I could be concerned that some might interpret a pause as a weakness, as some kind of hesitation because I don’t understand the subject matter, but I choose to ignore that concern, and focus instead on being me, and how I function best.

I wonder if we should all try to pause a little more. Think about what we say, how we say it, and how we deliver it. Imagine if meetings were 30% less talk, but with 50% better quality contributions as a result.

Embrace the silence. Embrace your own, and allow others to use theirs.

The ten principles of IT Management (and probably a lot of other jobs).

1. Work your way out of a job.

If there’s any procedure, task, or process that you have to carry out or manage more than once, you should consider automating it. What’s the point in you doing it, if a machine can? Of course, some things have to be done by a human, but can you streamline the task? For example, can you stop searching through event logs every week, and instead set up a monitoring system that will alert you by email and/or sms to certain types of errors?

2. Make life easier for users

Your users are customers. They pay your wages and are essentially the only reason you’re in the job. By making their life easier, you’re enabling them to make money for the business, instead of working the system. You’ll also be making them happier, and that’s a good thing.

3. Constantly evaluate costs, and try to reduce them.

Costs creep up. They always do, and forever will do. Keep an eye on them, and constantly try to think of ways that you can reduce them: do you need that old server, or can it be virtualised? Do you need all your mobile connections, or can you cancel some? Do you have any old printers that aren’t utilised enough? Get rid of them. Is your hardware vendor giving you the best deals? Are you out of contract with your telecoms firm, support firm, leased lines, printers, or anything else? If so, look for a better deal and/or renegotiate.

4. Constantly evaluate the business, and try to increase productivity.

Don’t take your eye off the ball with what the business is up to. It’s easy to focus on the day to day stresses of the IT function, and your pet projects, while the business starts running in a different direction, and before you know it, you’re off doing something that is hard work, and provides no benefit to the business, or you’ve missed an opportunity. Get involved in the different functions, like marketing, and strategy (even if your directors don’t actively involve you – just get in there anyway.)

5. Consolidate

One contract is better than two. Vendors fight harder for bigger contracts, and there are big efficiency savings to be made by consolidating. Multiple contracts for a similar service just wastes money, administrative effort, and doesn’t make the supplier work as hard for you.

Consolidation applies also to IT systems and infrastructure, of course, but only where sensible. One server can carry out multiple roles, but not at the expense of reliability, or necessary performance.

6. Be a pessimist – plan for disaster.

Shit does happen, and it will happen in ways that you didn’t predict. When setting up and supporting systems, ask yourself:

“How could this fail?”

“What’s the impact if it does fail?”

“How can i recover from failure?”

and

“How can I reduce the likelihood of it failing?”

Note that you can never completely prevent something from failing, but you can make it so unlikely that you don’t have to worry. Ideally, everything should have a redundant partner, ready to failover, but if that’s not possible, make sure to be ready to recover from failure, and mitigate the impact.

7. Be an optimist – plan for expansion and success.

As important as planning for failure, is planning for success. If you have 2000 users now, don’t spec a mailserver with just enough capacity to serve all of them just enough. Spec a server with enough capacity for 3000, or 4000, or 10000. Don’t spend more than you need to, but you can guarantee that if you only spec just enough now, it won’t be enough in a year or two.

8. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes.

Try new things, and accept that not all your endeavours will work out well. Some may turn out to be awful, but some may turn out great. Try out new technologies, new systems, or even old systems that you haven’t tried before. If you don’t know how to do something, ask. And if there’s nobody to ask, do it anyway, and work it out.

9. Stay on top of technological progress.

Go to seminars, webinars, workshops, training events, trade shows, and new product demonstrations. It’s easy to get behind in IT, and you don’t know the things you don’t know. You can’t do many of the things before this item if you don’t know about the newest technology, systems, products, or services. Also, by keeping really up to date, you can help your business keep ahead of their competitors.

10. Network

And I don’t mean with ethernet cables. Networking is especially important if you work in a small IT team, partly because you learn best from others. You’ll learn what other people are doing, how they’re doing it, why, and who with. You’ll find out how to do a better job for your business, and make a better career for yourself.