Manager vs leader: You finally got that promotion to the top tier, now what?

Irish Times

22-05-2025

Congratulations! You got the big promotion you've always wanted. It was a hard slog but you were focused, worked hard to meet the
company's goals
and directed your team well. You've made the great leap from manager to leader. Now what?
If you're a new leader or senior manager, it will help to understand the qualities needed and what people actually want from those who lead as opposed to what you think they need.
Most companies promote
staff
based on results, but they can fail to take into account the attributes that are most likely to help you succeed as a leader. Self-awareness and empathy are two key aspects, while more generally, personality type, personal characteristics, beliefs and behaviours are all important factors. Workshops, classes and coaching can all help you understand these things, but they don't fundamentally change your nature as a person.
As you're grappling with your new title, it might be helpful to understand what kind of leader you are so you can seek out appropriate development opportunities.
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Natalie Shope Griffin, an executive and organisational development consultant, identifies four kinds of leaders in her work.
Reluctant leaders
First, there are the reluctant leaders who have super managerial skills but doubt they'll succeed as leaders. They tend to suffer from imposter syndrome and have self-limiting beliefs. Behaviours include indecisiveness, risk aversion and a tendency to avoid conflict.
June, for example, was promoted to a senior role in a large multinational firm. Rather than realising she is there on merit, she believes she was a compromise candidate and second guesses everything. Her emails are long-winded, apologetic and frustrating to senior management. They wonder why June is struggling to embrace the opportunity that's been given to her.
She'll need a supportive mentor, lots of praise and help structuring her communications in a more professional way.
Arrogant leaders
Arrogant leaders are the other side of the coin. They think they know everything and have all the required leadership skills, with no development time needed. They're excellent at marketing themselves internally but tend to lack empathy, humility and deep listening skills, which are key characteristics of effective leaders.
Arrogant leaders are probably just as insecure as reluctant ones, but they know how to fake it and sell themselves to everyone they meet. They are exhausting for their teams.
Senior leadership will need to work with him on his listening and teamwork skills and hold him to account
Mark has just been made a senior engineer at his company but the complaints have already come in from his team. He ignores their opinions, doesn't ask questions and just jumps into the work without thinking about it strategically. Mark's fixed mindset is not helping him win friends and influence people, one of the effective leader's most important tasks.
Senior leadership will need to work with him on his listening and teamwork skills and hold him to account for changing his behaviours in his quarterly reviews.
Unknown leaders
The third group of people, according to Shope Griffin, are unknown leaders. They quietly beaver away at their jobs but fail to develop relationships outside of a small circle of close colleagues. Although they have a good mix of humility, confidence and listening skills, they're often overlooked for promotion or as sources of influence or expertise. These workers are the quiet engines that keep companies running.
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Susan loves her job at a medtech firm. She is very fond of her colleagues and they adore her but, even though she's a senior leader, she rarely speaks at meetings or events and never advocates for her team's needs. As such, she's largely invisible. This stymies her own ability to progress.
Susan needs help understanding the importance of internal networking and visibility for her long-term career. An internal mentor who understands the politics of progression would be helpful.
Workaholics
Lastly, workaholics are the most common profile among managers studied. These individuals have been rewarded for putting work above all else and spending excessive hours at the office. Unfortunately, workaholics often lack both the perspective and personality to inspire others.
They're so targeted on results that they forget to develop relationships and maintain physical and mental health. Sadly, the corporate world often rewards these unhealthy behaviours and this can lead to burnout and long-term health issues.
Tom is proud of his job title at a financial services firm and all he's achieved, and rightly so. However, he has little going on outside work and doesn't understand why everyone's work ethic is so poor. He works a minimum of 70 hours a week and has nothing to talk about but the job. Last year, his brother had a heart attack and died. Tom's managers, team and wife all worry about his health but can't get him to change his ways.
Your success will depend not just on your individual talents but on how effectively you get your team members to function together
This type of worker needs a serious intervention in terms of ensuring they work reasonable hours, turn off their emails and phones and get back to hobbies, exercise and relationships they may have left go in favour of work.
Austrian-American management consultant Peter Drucker said: 'Management is doing the things right while leadership is doing the right thing.' One focuses largely on the day-to-day of meeting targets, working efficiently and implementing strategic plans. The second focuses on high-level thinking, having a vision that others want to follow and creating or maintaining a healthy culture.
Workplaces are filled with different personalities and need effective leadership to push towards a common goal. Photograph: Getty Images
But what does your staff really want and need from you as a leader or senior manager? Earlier this year, global analytics firm Gallup released its global leadership report, entitled What Followers Want. The survey, which was wide in its reach, posed a question: what leader has the most positive influence on your daily life? It also asked people to list three words that best describe what this person contributes to their lives.
The results? The report stated: 'Hope stands out as the dominant need, accounting for 56 per cent of all attributes tied to positive leaders, far outnumbering mentions of the next key need, trust (33 per cent). Compassion (7 per cent) and stability (4 per cent) combined account for about one in nine positive leadership traits mentioned.'
Although leadership requires different skill sets, we're expected to transform from one to the other overnight. In your new role as a leader or senior manager, you're actually moving from a leader of work to a leader of people.
HR consultant Diane Gherson and academic Lynda Gratton have studied the transitions that are currently needed to successfully move from manager to leader.
They say: 'Waves of innovation have changed the role of the senior manager along three dimensions: power, skills and structure. In a power shift, managers have to think about making teams successful, not being served by them. In a skills shift, they're expected to coach performance, not oversee tasks. And in a structural shift, they have to lead in more fluid environments.'
Your success will depend not just on your individual talents but on how effectively you get your team members to function together. If you focus on five core traits – direction, discipline, drive, dynamism and collaboration – you will transform what you can achieve as a cohesive unit.
Regardless of your leadership type, exhibiting collaborative behaviours and developing personal relationships will put you on a sound footing. Equally, listening to everybody equally and holding people to account where appropriate will help you become a great leader of people.
Margaret E Ward is chief executive of Clear Eye, a leadership consultancy. [e-mail]