Hayley Tierney

Mrs. Godfrey
Honors Leadership Studies
22 September 2019
Manager vs. Leader
1. Leaders develop followers, while managers have subordinates to do things a certain way.
2. Leaders use conflict to keep momentum and fix what needs to be fixed in order to
continue, while managers often avoid conflict.
3. Leaders tend to take new routes and offer new ideas for new paths, managers stick to the
basics and what essentially has been successful in the past.
4. Leaders facilitate decision making, while managers make the decisions themselves.
5. Leaders inspire people to do their own work, managers control people and essentially
force the work onto other people.
6. Leaders advocate mission, managers advocate tasks.
7. Leaders think long term and work towards a long term goal, while managers are focused
on the short term agenda.
8. Leaders encourage personal growth, while managers push for growth in the company
itself.
9. Leaders often break the rules in order to allow for an open environment that encourages
growth from mistakes, while managers set specific rules so that they can keep order.
10. Leaders establish a sense of trust, while managers rely on control.
11. Leaders communicate in a way that their followers can understand the big picture and the
long term goal, while managers communicate in a way that their subordinates feel they
have a short term goal that needs to get done quickly and efficiently.
12. Leaders foster a sense of pride in their followers' work, while managers simply give a
stamp of approval for a task that was well done.
13. Leaders have an approach that simply shows their followers the direction in which they
should be headed, while managers provide a detailed plan that needs to be followed.
14. Leaders give credit, managers take credit.
15. Leaders sell the vision and offer room for ideas to be heard, managers simply tell their
employers what the vision is and how to get it done.
Sources:
Arruda, William. “9 Differences Between Being A Leader And A Manager.” ​Forbes​,

https://www.forbes.com/sites/williamarruda/2016/11/15/9-differences-between-be

ing-a-leader-and-a-manager/. Accessed 21 Sept. 2019.

Walters, Natalie. “17 of the Biggest Differences between Managers and Leaders.”

Business Insider,​

https://www.businessinsider.com/biggest-differences-between-managers-and-lead

ers-2016-3. Accessed 21 Sept. 2019.

Real-World Examples:

[Manager]

My boss at work: ​I work in retail and at work, Chris is the general manager of the store. He
oversees the day to day sales and monitors things like our conversion rates and encourages the
membership program to customers. While Chris often leads by example, he is much more of a
manager in terms of goals. He looks at the goals of the company day by day and how our store is
improving daily. He also primarily focuses on making sure the store as a whole is functioning
properly and that the associates, like me, are promoting a safe and welcoming environment for
customers.
[Leader]

Ms. Voci: ​Other than the obvious History Teacher, Ms. Voci is also Head of Campus Ministry.
In this role, Ms. Voci consistently steps outside of the box and uses Retreat as a way to inspire us
to Retreat Leaders to support each other and foster a successful Retreat Program at school. She is
always leading by example and encouraging us to learn from our mistakes, rather than let them
drag our self-confidence down. She inspires us to keep our long term mission of spreading the
Gospel to those around us by allowing us to cultivate our own ideas into the Retreat Program.