Leadership That Matters

Chapter

TWO

What Have We Learned About Leadership?

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

Tao Te Ching, Chapter 64

To begin to understand leadership that matters, we start with the beginning of leadership research. We will review some results of the past hundred years of formal research on leadership. But, before we can look at these research results, we must consider the definition of leadership and the difference between leadership and management.

Leaders and Managers

Historically, researchers made little distinction between the terms “leadership” and “management.” In contrast, today there appears to be considerable agreement that management and leadership are not at all the same. Much of the research on leadership, however—even ...