If you are managing a small organization of people and are not leading from the front, logic dictates that you are leading from the back.

And if you are leading from the back… enjoy the perceived cushy ride it while it lasts.

Chances are you are on your way out unless you learn how to lead from the front.

Fast.

10 Signs You Are Leading From The Back

1. You have an office and your employees have cubicles.
2. You spend a lot any time in that office.
3. You like to “manage by spreadsheets”.  No one “manages” a spreadsheet — they manage people.
4. You have no idea what MBWA means.
5. You have no idea (if you pride yourself on being smart you will replace the word “idea” with “visibility”) what the outcome of your groups efforts will be. You just sit back and hope for a positive result at the end of each month or quarter.
6. You don’t do a daily morning huddle. Where everyone is standing up. And participating.
7. You are not the trusted source of information from your people. They trust someone else more in the organization than you and tell them all of their “secrets”.
8. You think that you can “systematize” everything so that you can sit back in the back and remain the leader.
9. You are not decisive in your actions. Leaders from the front rarely (read: almost never) suffer from “paralysis by analysis”
10. You do at least 4 of the things I mentioned above and think that these 10 reasons are crap. This is one of your problems – you self-deceive and hope no one notices.

Do good leadership skills equate into good management skills?

Maybe, maybe not.

But if you are in charge of “managing” less than about 50 people — leadership skills will get you a lot further down the road than management skills.