Vision, leadership and......football?

As I near the end of my Master's degree program at Troy University, I do find myself contemplating the future, both personally and professionally. The email from Dr. Padgett acknowledging my successful navigation of the capstone comprehensive exam actually triggered a number of items for me: relief, confidence, uncertainty, and accomplishment.

But it also brought two nagging questions: Now what? How am I going to move from this new level of accomplishment in my education to a new level of challenge and effort in my professional life? Egads, I'm reliving undergraduate college graduation all over again.

What it means for me professionally is an easier topic to tackle. I graduated in the mid 80s with my bachelor's degree and couldn't wait to get into the field of public relations. I was hired shortly after graduation and just nine months later, I was let go after the firm I worked for lost 2-3 large clients at the same time. It was my introduction into the fickle business world and how the field of communication is viewed differently in theory and in practice. All the books we read for our classes stress how critical communication is at every level of any organization.

Last week, we learned Chester Barnard noted in 1938 that the first executive function is to develop and maintain some type of communication system, yet it is routinely one of the first places within an organization where cuts are made or eliminated when faced with economic adversity. A lesson I have learned personally four times during my professional 20-year career in communications.

I provide this background as a means of context for where my vision is derived from, moving forward into the next chapter of my professional life. The information and knowledge I have gained from the Master’s program at Troy University is only a starting point. It will be up to me to not only continue my education, but to use my training and experiences to develop the ability to develop a vision for my future; short-, intermediate-, and long-term.

What I failed to realize earlier in my career is that education is not finite. Just because I finished my bachelor's degree, I was not finished learning. As I put my skills and abilities into practice, I was not paying heed to the changing nature of critical parts of my daily job.

For instance, traditional media was changing in front of my eyes with the rise of the internet and I failed to see it, plan for it and champion ways in which the organization I was working for could leverage those changes to better meet the overall goals of the agency.

It wasn't until my third year away from the field, working in retail, that I fully realized my true miscalculation was neglecting to keep an eye on the horizon. It was one of the reasons I was drawn to the program at Troy University.

Troy's leaders did not fall asleep at the wheel. They did study and research the current fields of Journalism and Communications and planned for the future. By working in the field, I know the value communication can bring to a company. However, if I can not translate that impact into clearly defined results -- results that will at some point be assessed by bean-counters who will eventually put me into a "cost" or "asset" column – I may find myself holding yet another pink slip. My vision is to not experience that again.

I would offer the distinction between “management” and “leadership” as one of the reasons companies thrive or falter. In an article by John Kotter (2013) in the Harvard Business Review, the author makes a simple declaration: management and leadership are not the same. He notes that management is the nuts and bolts operation of common processes most people are familiar with – planning, staffing, budgeting, production goals, etc.

But leadership, he contends, is more about leading an organization into the future, capitalizing on opportunities as they present themselves, helping others within the company not only see the vision but to buy in and become advocates for the vision put forward by the leadership of the company. And this leadership isn’t always found in the c-level offices. It needs to be at all levels of the organization.

I am not a fan of sports analogies, generally, but this seems like a pretty straightforward representation of the difference between leadership and management. There are 32 teams in the National Football League and every season there are coaches who get fired. Many of the coaches become head coaches after putting in time as a coach of the defense, the offense, or the special teams. They are experts in a specific aspect of the game – scoring points, preventing points, etc. They are “managing” a particular process of the team. The head coach role, however, is not restricted to a particular process. It is weaving them all together to achieve a longer-term vision of getting the team not only to win the next game, but enable them to have the tools in place to win a majority of the games to ensure a playoff spot and, ultimately, the Super Bowl. It’s about “leading” and motivating all members of the team, all members of management, to buy into a singular vision that the team can successfully win against any other team they face.

And every winning football team has “leaders” on the field. A quarterback, a linebacker, a safety, etc. They are not a coach. They are just “line staff” members who understand the vision of the head coach, and help to get the other members of the team to buy into that vision. The leaders are not always on the coaching staff.

Interestingly, many of the coaches who get fired from head coach positions do not leave the game. Instead, they return to the “management” positions they held before, where they excelled. They may not have the vision or leadership skills to be a head coach, but they are still experts in the particular processes that make up a successful team.

As noted by Kotter, leadership is not only at the top. It needs to be throughout all levels of the organization (team). A strategic communicator needs to be a leader, supporting the vision of the organization leadership as well as positioning communication as a critical tool for accomplishing the goals of the organization.

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About the Author: David is a dedicated husband and proud father of a strapping fourteen year-old son and twin five year-old daughters. He has twenty years of professional communication experience, working in the public relations field. He has worked for public relations firms in Metro Detroit, hospitals and a state-wide faith-based social service organization helping at-risk children and their families. He grew up on a mid-sized Michigan blueberry farm, spent two years in Texas and now resides with his family outside Tampa, Florida. An avid reader and photographer, David also enjoys building furniture using recycled/upcycled wooden pallets.