'Leadership v Management Part 1: Echoes of Taylorism' with Dr Richard Claydon

Leaders tolerate chaos and lack of structure and are thus prepared to keep answers in suspense, avoiding premature closure on important issues. Managers seek order and control and are almost compulsively addicted to disposing of problems even before they understand their potential significance. - Abraham Zaleznik

This quote, from 1977, was perhaps the first to distinguish between the disciplines of leadership and management. A dozen years later, the founding father of leadership studies, Warren Bennis, had determined twelve differences between the two. 

Today, thousands of simplistic memes and listicles drive the division home.

But how did we start thinking like this?  Before the late 1970s, we would never have divided the two concepts.  Management was leadership, and leadership was management.  Why did they split? Has the division helped or hindered organisational performance?

In Part One of a Two Part DD investigation into the split between leadership and management, we will examine:

• The divide between the two 19th Century theories of leadership, and why it resonates today
• How management was invented to save society from the whims of selfish industrialists and the manipulations of lazy workers
• The simplistic treatment of the behavioural element of management in these models, and how the early behavioural theorists of leadership began to address it

Dr Richard Claydon is the co-founder of EQ Lab, and the designer of the Future of Leadership module at Macquarie Business School’s Global MBA Program (ranked #6 globally by CEO Magazine).

He was awarded the highest achievable marks for a Ph.D in behavioural science. A Harvard Top-200 Management expert and business columnists for the Guardian newspaper have described this research as “a touchstone for the future work in management and organisation”, “outstanding in daring imagination” and “at the forefront of modern discussion and debate.”

Richard is a tier one tennis player, have coached tennis professionally, and also designed the tactics creator for the multi award-winning and world-leading management simulation, Football Manager.