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Article One:
Introduction – The Main Purpose Of A
Manager
By: Richard M. Pheasant
Director - Core Training Solutions

Copyright: Core Training Solutions Ltd

Reference Number: 7446240919S011
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Introduction – The Main Purpose Of A Manager

It is summer 2019 as I complete this introduction, and in the English 2018-2019

soccer season over 50 managers were fired by their clubs.1 You may be wondering
why this is relevant as a business or organisational manager, but the reality is the
vast majority of professional soccer clubs in the UK (and professional sports clubs
around the world) are being run as businesses. Whatever the ideals of the fans, this
is the way that much of sport is run now, and making money is seen as a key part
of the success of these clubs.

The number of managers fired by soccer clubs in England this past year links
closely to this introduction, because I want to open with the following question:

What Is A Manager’s Main Purpose?

This is the key question that any website or book on effective management should
begin with, because for anyone to be effective in their job, they should definitely
know and understand the purpose of what it is they are doing.

I have trained several thousand managers over the last decade. A common feature
of many of them was that it was the first time they had received any kind of formal
training in being developed as a manager. Some had been in their positions for over
twenty years, while others just a few months. Even so, many of these managers
had not considered what their main purpose was, and I suspect this is true of
many other managers across the world.

When asked what they thought the main purpose of a manager was, a number of
them suggested that it was to ensure that their employees do the work they have
been assigned to do. Whilst true, it is not a manager’s main purpose. Others
suggested it is to ensure that their employees are following the regulations and
procedures of the company. Again, this is one of the responsibilities, but it is not
the main purpose of a manager. I could go on, but I am hoping an answer is
stirring in your own mind.

So, what is the main purpose of a manager’s role? This question becomes easier to
consider, when we think about the purpose of a soccer manager - or any
professional team sport manager. Why are they there? Why have they been
employed?

I would not be surprised if you had begun to work it out by now, but if not, the
main purpose of any business manager, just like a soccer manager, is to get
results. The same is true of managers within other organisations. In the UK, if a
soccer manager’s team is not achieving the expected results, the manager is fired,
especially if the club is in the top-tiers, because relegation means the club will lose
money. The same is no doubt true in American Football or Baseball, and in all

1
https://www.thesackrace.com/managerial-casualties [Accessed 08/08/19]

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professional team sports, especially where a lot of money is involved. As already

mentioned, this means a key part of the success of any club is making money (even
if for the players and fans it is about winning trophies). According to the league
manager’s website in England, the average tenure of an English soccer league
manager in the 2016-2017 season was 1.16 years2. The expectation to win is high
due to the millions of pounds of money involved3, and the manager of a
professional soccer club is always under pressure to get results.

Whilst the expectation is not as severe, this is still absolutely true of the business
manager, as well as many of those working for different types of organisations. A
manager’s main purpose is to get results, pure and simple. For this reason, a
manager should be assessed on whether they have achieved the expected results
(their goals) or indeed exceeded them, and if they have, then they should be
rewarded as such. If they have failed to achieve them, then they should be reviewed
to find out the reason or reasons why this happened. Some of this will be explored
in later articles. The main point to understand for now is that, if you are a
Manager (or a Team Leader, Supervisor or Director), you are in that position
because your company/organisation depends on you to achieve goals and get
results.

However, there is another significant point here towards understanding a

manager’s purpose which is that, primarily, he or she is not the one getting those
results. It is the team that reports to them who are the ones who are actually
attempting to achieve the desired results that the manager wants, or that the
manager is expected to achieve. Just as a sports manager is not on the field of play
trying to achieve the scores, so the business manager is not the one who is directly
achieving the required outcomes. This may be slightly different for supervisors and
team leaders, as they are in the field of play, but the majority of the work in
achieving the results is still being done by those they oversee.

This reasoning is the explanation behind the definition of management given by

Robert Blake and Jane Mouton, who in 1964 said that “Management is achieving
results through the efforts of others.”4

This quote is essentially true of all managers – your purpose is to get results, and
those results are generally achieved by other people, namely the employees who
report to you and whom you oversee.

This is why leadership skills are essential for any manager in order for them to be
effective, which is the reason that a significant amount of the future training

2 http://www.leaguemanagers.com/documents/55/LMA_End_of_Season_Report_and_Statistics_2016-17.pdf
[Accessed 15/03/19]
3 According to the BBC, the 2018 play-off final for promotion to the top-tier premier league in the English League

was word £160 million pounds ($210 million dollars), rising to £280 million ($365 million) if they avoided relegation
the next season: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/44238566 [Accessed 03/05/19]
4 Blake, R. and Mouton, J. (1964). The Managerial Grid.

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articles on this site will be focused on helping you to develop your own leadership
competencies with those whom you oversee.

Thus a key part of being an effective manager is developing and improving your
leadership competencies. However, there are also clear differences between
Leadership, and what I call ‘Pure Management’. The meaning of ‘Pure Management’
will be explained more fully in a later article, but it is called this so as to
distinguish it from the term ‘Management’. As will be explained later, what we call
‘Management’ should include both ‘Leadership’ and what I now refer to as ‘Pure
Management’.

The next two articles on the site to follow this one will explain what is meant by
leadership and ‘pure management’, and are foundational for all managers to absorb
and understand. It should also make clear why we need to dispense with the very
unhelpful discussion on whether a manager needs to be a leader or a manager5.
This debate simply leads to a dead end and even more misunderstanding because,
as will be explained, a manager must actually develop and improve both their
leadership and their (pure) management competencies in order to be successful
and effective, regardless of whether you call them a ‘leader’ or a ‘manager’.

For now, it is paramount for you as a manager to fully understand that the results
you are seeking will depend on your team, and to recognise that leadership
competencies come first, and are absolutely essential in helping you to be more
effective at your job.

We also need to make sure that the focus is about ‘leading’ people, not ‘managing’
them. There are many books and articles using the term ‘managing people’. This
might well be slightly true when dealing with an employee who is getting over-
emotional, and you need to manage that or handle that situation.

However, the fact remains that a manager has to ‘lead’ a team, not ‘manage’ it. I
have always appreciated the quote from Rear Admiral Grace Hopper, who said “You
cannot manage men into battle. You manage things; you lead people."6 This quote
will be reinforced when discussing the actual differences between leadership and
pure management, especially the original meanings of the two words ‘lead’ and
‘manage’. It will put forward the premise that leadership is about people and that
pure management is about resources, which will be unpacked in later articles.7

5 Abraham Zaleznik started this debate in 1974 in an article in Harvard Business Review called ‘Managers and
Leaders: Are They Different?’. In my view, no, because all managers must practice leadership and management in
order to be effective. ‘
6 (Emphasis on this is mine.) This quote is widely found on the internet, and I have used it many times when

training. However, I cannot find the original source.

7 Another example where manage or management is incorrectly used in business is with the term ‘managing change’

or ‘change management’. Perhaps if we changed the terminology, managers would be better at it, because it is about
‘leading change’, or ‘leading your team through change’. Either way, the crux is that it is to do with leadership, not
management.

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It therefore takes effective leadership to get the results needed from your people,
something that is now getting more recognition. A recent example comes from
Anthony Gell in his book on Leadership. He says this: “Ultimately…. leadership is
about results. Brian Tracy told me once, ‘the number one job of a leader is to get
results (it’s worth pointing out that many leaders forget this fundamental truism.)”8

In business the manager has to be a leader. If you have people reporting to you,
and through them you have to get results (which is essentially true of all business
managers), then you must practice leadership. And as Anthony Gell points out
(which this introduction also makes clear) your number one job is to get results.

The second key part to being an effective manager is that you have to efficiently use
the resources available to you, in order to achieve your goals and get the required
results. Again, more on this will be covered later.

Based on this, and what has previously been mentioned, the definition I give for
management is this: “Management is about getting the required results through the
efforts of others, along with efficiently using the resources you have.” This is the
meaning of management that I will be unpacking throughout the following articles,
and it is my hope that the aspects covered will help you to become a more effective
manager.

Since it takes leadership to get results, much of what I write next will be primarily
focused on this, and how you as a manager can develop your leadership
competencies to become better and more effective at being a leader.

The next article will focus on the topic of leadership, and defines and explores what
leadership is about. It is followed by an article on the importance of practicing
integrity as a leader. The next one defines what is meant by ‘pure management’, so
we can see how it differs from leadership, but ultimately makes the point that all
managers must be effective at both to be successful in their role.

Other articles that follow will look into the characteristics of effective leaders, along
with several important leadership theories and models, which will provide an
overview of the topic, and will consider only what I believe is practical for managers
to know and understand. There are already many books and articles discussing
many different models and theories on leadership.9 It would take many months to
go through each of these, or even the main ones, so I will only focus on what I
believe to be helpful, practical and relevant to managers at this time.

Once these foundational articles have been completed, we will begin to explore
some of the practical ways that managers can improve their leadership and
management competencies. Each of these will help you to become more effective in

8Gell, A. (2014) The Book of Leadership, p.XX

9Many of these are academic books and research that recite many different theories and models. Some of the more
helpful books I will include on the website at a later date, for those who want to read more widely on the topic. I
will only include those I think are relevant and helpful for most managers.

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leading your team, as well as using the resources you have, in order to achieve, or
even exceed, your required or expected results.

I would strongly suggest that you take your time in going through each article, and
where there is an exercise, do try and resist the temptation to skip it. By thinking
through and making some notes, this will help to stimulate you and make the
contents covered by each article relevant to you professionally, as well as helping
you make decisions on how you can become a more effective manager.

Richard Pheasant - September 2019

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Management Training Exercise

1. A manager’s main purpose is to achieve the desired results. It is therefore

imperative that you are fully aware of what these desired results are. What is it
that you line manager or your company expects you and your department to
achieve this year? These should be your goals.

In the space below, write down the goals that your department/team need to
achieve this year.

Does your manager agree with the goals that you have stated above? Have you
confirmed them? In other words will meeting or exceeding these goals fulfil his
or her expectations of you?

If this is something you are not sure about, you need to have that
conversation with them.

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