Some people like management and thrive at it, but there is a big difference between leadership and management — and woefully few people seem to have an abundant capacity for both.

One of my sisters managed county and city library systems in two different states and, by all reports, did gangbusters at it. She won praise and awards for creative problem-solving and working through the tough competing priorities within the communities in which she served. All the while she managed the pick-up-sticks of board, employee, and volunteer hierarchies. Once she even got all of her visiting siblings (five of us) and our partners to spend an afternoon packing up books in an old library to be moved to a new one.

She must have overseen hundreds of such volunteer events everywhere she went. Whew! It exhausts me just writing about it.

Leadership is a........

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