I know that there is a profound difference between leadership and management but I am not sure why everywhere I look there is such a lack of leadership...

"Managers are people who do things right and leaders are people who do the right thing"
Leading is influencing, guiding in a direction, course, action, opinion while managing means to bring about, to accomplish, to have charge of or responsibility for or to conduct. There are great managers everywhere but very few great leaders. In his book "Learning to Lead: A Workbook on Becoming a Leader" Warren Bennis, writer of leadership resources and business professor at the University of Southern California, identifies the differences between leaders and manager.

• The manager maintains; the leader develops.
• The manager accepts reality; the leader investigates it.
• The manager focuses on systems and structures; the leader focuses on people.
• The manager relies on control; the leader inspires trust.
• The manager has a short-range view; the leader has a long-range perspective.
• The manager asks how and when; the leader asks what and why.
• The manager has his or her eye always on the bottom line; the leader has his or her eye on the horizon.
• The manager imitates; the leader originates.
• The manager accepts the status quo; the leader challenges it.
• The manager is the classic good soldier; the leader is his or her own person.

Times like this require us to think more in terms of leadership and as leaders we need to ask questions like...

• "What is really going on here?"
• "How do we remain relevant?"
• "How do we fulfil our goals in these changing times?"
• "How do we make colleagues understand that what we do is important?"

Chris