As a leader you are one person influencing another to willingly work toward a predetermined objective. Managers are not always leaders. They need to be good at that distinctive and interpersonal facet. Leaders have drive and motivation. Leaders are honest and have integrity. Leaders have self-confidence and have cognitive ability. Leaders also know their business (Dessler 257).
To become a manager you must exhibit the skill or the ability to perform the job in an effective manner. To be a leader you must have the traits or the unchanging characteristics of a person that predisposes someone to act in a particular way (Dessler 256).
At 24 Hour Fitness there are many great leaders and some so-so managers. One of the mistakes that 24 Hour Fitness makes is taking someone who has really great salesman skills and promoting them to a management position in which they do not have the traits of a leader. .
24 Hour Fitness prides itself on the energy you feel when you walk into a club. It exudes from the employees. In order to keep staff with an upbeat attitude and appearance it is important to have the right leader. At the core of an energized workforce is the quality of the one-on-one relationships that individual workers have with their managers, and the trust, respect, and consideration that their managers show toward them on a daily basis. Getting the best from the workers is above all a product of the "softer- side of management "how individuals are treated, inspired, and challenged to do their best work "and the support, resources, and guidance that is provided by managers to help make exceptional employee performance a reality (Nelson 2).
In the book 1001 Ways to Energize Employees, Nelson tells us that the work environment and the degree to which it is serves to enable or inhibit individuals in getting work done is also important. Something as simple as sprucing up a drab workplace or holding an occasional morale-building celebration can make a difference.
