Everyone can be a leader…

July 10, 2020 – Reading time: 4 minutes, Video: 1 hour 44 minutes

…in order to make that choice, it is critical to understand the differences between a manager and a leader. 40 students from Cologne Business School (CBS) took up the challenge to grasp the principles of leadership from Frank Lichtenberg, Director at INVENSITY. He spoke about “What Leadership Has to Do with Going to the Gym,” during a virtual keynote on Friday, June 5, 2020.

If you want to become a leader as well, check out the keynote video on the right.

Here are the key facts of the lecture:

A leader enables the ones around him to the best of his ability so that they can reach their goals. With his forward-thinking vison, a leader inspires people and sees the opportunity for growth in a challenge. He believes in and uses change to prevent stagnation and guide through uncertainty, which ensures the company’s long-term survival.

A manager in contrast, produces results and the achievement of short-term goals in mind. By reaching his own goals through managing projects, delegating tasks and meeting objectives, the manager ensures the survival of a company here and now.

This shows that while they act and communicate differently, both, the manager and the leader are important and of equal value in an organization. Only the synergy of both can lead to long term success and survival of an organization.

Leaders are long-term focused, they work hard to achieve excellence, not to reach short term success. As an athlete, regardless of the level, we do the same thing. When we go to the gym and work out, we are not going to see any changes in physical strength or appearance immediately. We need to be patient, resilient, and disciplined to become stronger. We need to keep working out without getting a reward and that is often frustrating.

A true leader can relate to that because enabling others is not immediately rewarding. If you enable and thus lead the ones around you continuously, it will strengthen them and can ultimately lead to excellence in an organization when they in turn enable others to become leaders as well.

Dr. Lutz Lyding, supervisor & coach DGSv, group dynamics coach & organizational  consultant and lecturer for business psychology at CBS, drew the conclusion: “Frank Lichtenberg delivered the message ‘Leadership MEETS Management – about the inseparability and flexible design of both roles in successful organizations.’”

Lyding organized the keynote as part of his undergraduate class Applied Business Psychology: “In this class, we aim to combine theory and practice by getting the views of entrepreneurs on our theoretical topics – and thus enable graduating students to transfer smoothly into the professional life.”

The students were able to get insights from an entrepreneur with great experience in the field. Lyding adds: “Mr. Lichtenberg’s lecture was distinguished by the practical relevance and perspective of an entrepreneur on our scientific and business-psychological topics. He was able to report perceptibly on his experiences and chose a simple language that is memorable and prepares our graduates for their careers.”

INVENSITY thanks the Cologne Business School as well as Dr. Lyding for hosting this virtual event. The keynote was a great opportunity to share our views on leadership and motivate young professionals to take on leadership responsibility.

Author

Link to video

Here you can get a link to watch the whole keynote.

Resources

INVENSITY Academy Services

Career at INVENSITY