Management vs Leadership

Practice Management is not the Answer

Being a good practice manager is often not the answer.
In fact most business owners don’t even think much about management. Or leadership.
I searched the few message boards on the internet for some signs of activity in these areas. It seems owners aren’t too interested in these areas. There is some interest in management but few searches or sites for leadership.
Management is something we think we need to work on when our month end numbers are not what we wish they were. But if an article on a technical matter catches our eye, practice management goes onto the back burner again.
Is someone is very successful (very profitable) in their business, we think they must have a handle on management. And they probably do. But success comes from leadership not management.
What do I mean?
I had a real lesson in management this past week. I have always thought of myself as a good manager because I was happy with my results. A lot of things have to be done right for this to happen.
But this week my office manager resigned. So I had to be the office manager while I searched for a new one. It soon became very clear to me that I was not a great manager. Not only that but I really didn’t like management.
This is when it occurred to me that management and leadership are actually at odds with each other! In the past I had always kind of rolled the two together in the broad category of the business side of things. And although they are both useful and necessary, they are definitely not the same thing.
For example, as a leader, I am always trying to build relationship with my staff. I want to be nice to them. I want to get them on side and help me. I want to grow the practice so I can pay them more and reward them more so they are even happier to work with me.
Then I read the office manual for new hires. You can’t do this. We don’t pay you for that. We will fire you if you do this, etc, etc. It was all negative. But I suppose it all needs to be covered. You see, the role of management is getting things done. It is also about controlling costs. It is not about growing the business.
Growing the business is a leadership issue. Why do we need to do to grow? How can we get more customers? What new services can we learn to perform? What do clients want? How can we keep them from leaving?
The leader wants to grow and add capacity and is willing to pay the price that it takes. The manager wants to be efficient with 0% downtime and no wasted salaries or capacity.
The good thing for us owners, is that there are people out there who love to manage. This is good because it frees us up to lead.
I never realized how far I had gone from managing until I was forced back into it. Managing is necessary. A good manager gets it all done while still keeping everyone happy. But it is not my calling. I want to lead the practice to the next level. I want to see where we can learn something so we can get better. I want the cost of doing this to be recorded as an investment not an expense because a year from now we will be earning way more than the cost of the learning. I want to find ways to make my business the best of the best.
If you are an owner start to think of ways to lead. Hire a manager to manage the details. You develop the big picture of where you want to get to. If you get there, you will be better off in every way even if some of your manager’s numbers are 10% over what they should be.
Better to be doing the right thing a little inefficiently than the wrong thing to perfection.