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MICHAEL DEMPSEY - Cranfield University

MICHAEL DEMPSEY - Cranfield University

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Managing action - leadership<br />

That’s called the leadership part of the Chief Executive. My job<br />

isn’t just to run the union. My job is to take it somewhere.<br />

(Interviewee K)<br />

Trade union leadership in these terms is a concept which is almost<br />

certainly understood, within and without trade unions:-<br />

Taking the union somewhere…….managing an idea, a crusade.<br />

(Interviewee K)<br />

However, in PCS there have been courses for managers discussing<br />

this very subject:-<br />

They discussed it on the leadership courses, the difference<br />

between leadership and management and management tended<br />

to be the harder side, the figures and the budget, forward<br />

planning and so on and leadership tended to be the softer side,<br />

involving staff, communicating with them, training and I suppose<br />

what we are looking for was a balance between the two.<br />

(Interviewee J)<br />

But there are different emphases given to each of these concepts by<br />

different managers. One distinguishes between two faces of<br />

leadership:-<br />

One is a leadership role in respect of the team here -- the full<br />

time officers, the support staff and the lay people. It involves<br />

developing and supporting people, delivering the product and<br />

then I have a very significant bargaining role of my own. I<br />

suppose there is a fourth bit which is a leadership relationship<br />

with our elected executive. I think that is leadership rather than<br />

management, I suppose. There is a rather fine line between<br />

leadership and management. It is struggling to find a balance<br />

between those different aspects (interviewee G)<br />

Another attempts a definition which is slightly different from that<br />

evidently arrived at in the leadership and management courses,<br />

implying that the distinction is to some extent qualitative:-<br />

I think that good management is leadership with a very light<br />

touch on supervision, if you like. Bad management is very heavy<br />

on supervision and no leadership whatsoever (Interviewee C)<br />

And one manager sees management and leadership, it seems, in<br />

exactly opposite terms to the way in which it was perceived by those<br />

attending the Industrial Society courses:-<br />

I am sure the initiative one could take is for the management<br />

side of the leadership role to click in and say "how do we<br />

develop that person? Why have we got them just working in that<br />

role? If they have got that skill, why are they not recruiting? Why<br />

183

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