For a long time, we lived with a reassuring image of the manager: the “high‑end foreman.” Their job? Keep the machine running smoothly, make decisions, and check that everything was executed. It was simple. It was clean and clear.
But that clarity gradually fell apart when it collided with the pace of today’s world. Things move too fast for the old hierarchical pyramid. By the time information goes up and instructions come back down, reality has already changed.
So, to avoid losing our footing, we invented a new story. Everywhere you hear the same tune: “Stop managing, be a Leader!” “Stop giving orders, be a Coach!”
I understand what these words are trying to fix: we want more humanity, less harshness. That’s a good intention. But as a coaching professional, what I mostly see is how exhausting this has become. I want to challenge this double myth of the “Manager‑Leader‑Coach.” We need to stop confusing the value of a posture (being able to coach, being able to lead) with the impossible expectation of being all of that, all the time
The Great Confusion: Why “Manager = Leader” Is a Refuge
There’s first a simple psychological reason: it’s a reassuring story. When an organization goes through turbulence—which is the normal state of today’s economy—it instinctively seeks a fixed point. A figure. A person who “sees clearly,” who “embarks.” We then tell a story of piloting: someone must hold the helm. It’s reassuring for shareholders, for employees, and even for managers themselves who find narcissistic validation in it.
This narrative relies on a distinction often cited from John P. Kotter: management helps the organization cope with complexity (planning, organizing, controlling, stabilizing), while leadership helps cope with change (giving direction, aligning, mobilizing). Kotter emphasizes an essential point, often forgotten: one does not replace the other. Leadership doesn’t “correct” bad management, no more than management can compensate for a lack of direction. The problem starts when we turn this functional complementarity into an individual injunction: since leadership is needed to survive, every manager must become an inspiring leader. That’s when we dangerously slide from a collective need (producing direction) to an individual burden (asking each manager to carry it as a permanent identity). This heroization often masks the real underlying problem: the organization’s loss of control over itself.
Anthropology of the Boss: “Humans Need a Boss”? …Not So Fast.
This is the objection I hear most often. A leader raises his hand and says: “Autonomy is nice, but humans need a boss. It’s anthropological.”
We must take this argument seriously, but dissect it. Yes, humans, as social animals, tolerate chaos and radical uncertainty poorly. But do they need a “boss” in the sense of a superior authority who decides for them?
My answer is nuanced: Humans need landmarks and security, not necessarily submission to a single figure.
What the collective needs to reduce its anxiety is clarity:
- Where are we going? (Direction)
- What are the rules of the game? (Framework)
- Am I safe here? (Belonging)
For centuries, these needs were met (or not) by a single person embodying authority. We thus amalgamated “need for structure” and “need for a boss.” Yet, sociology shows we can dissociate these functions. We can have a strong, secure framework without an omnipotent boss.
What Sociology Reminds Us (Crozier and Dupuy)
To understand why these injunctions often ring false, we must return to the fundamentals of organizational sociology, from Michel Crozier to François Dupuy. In his book Lost in Management, François Dupuy delivers a ruthless diagnosis: management has lost control.
By distancing themselves from the field, by multiplying layers and reporting processes, managers no longer necessarily know what their teams are really doing. They have lost knowledge of the “real work” (the strategies people deploy to succeed despite faulty tools) to focus solely on the “prescribed work.” Dupuy brilliantly explains that power lies in zones of uncertainty. Today, the one who masters uncertainty is no longer the manager, but the expert, the technician, the front-office salesperson who holds critical information. Faced with this loss of authority, the company often reacts by fleeing forward: the incantation to “Soft Skills.” We ask the manager to be an “inspiring leader” or a “benevolent coach” to compensate for the fact that he no longer has a grip on the technical and organizational reality of work. We prefer to talk about “Values” and “Vision” rather than understanding why the information system prevents people from working.
The “Manager-Coach” Trap: Schizophrenia, Risks, and Remedies
This is where we must address the second injunction, perhaps even more insidious than the first: “Be a manager coach.”
On paper, the idea is noble: move away from the “little boss” toward a manager who helps growth. But in the reality of the field, combining these two hats is high-wire acrobatics that often borders on the impossible mission. As a certified professional coach, I too often see the damage from this confusion.
Why is it so difficult, what are the real risks, and above all, how to get out of it?
The Major Difficulty: Impossible Neutrality
The difficulty is not a matter of skill (learning to ask open questions can be learned). It is structural. Coaching, to be done properly, requires benevolent neutrality and a totally safe space where speech is free. Yet, the manager is, by definition, “judge and party.”
- He carries the company’s objectives (performance).
- He has power of sanction and reward (raise, promotion, dismissal).
- He has a legal subordination link.
Asking an employee to open up about their deep brakes or doubts to the person who may decide their year-end bonus is a paradoxical injunction. The employee will always, consciously or not, be performing. The absolute trust necessary for coaching is polluted by the hierarchical stake.
The Risks: When the Remedy Becomes Poison
If we deny this difficulty, we expose ourselves to three major risks, for the individual and the system.
Risk A: Manipulation (“wild coaching”) This is the most frequent risk. The manager uses coaching techniques (Socratic questioning) to lead the employee where he wants them to go. Example: “And you, what solution do you propose to finish this file this weekend?” It’s not coaching, it’s gentle manipulation. The employee feels trapped: they’re made to believe they have a choice, when they must validate the boss’s agenda. This creates devastating cynicism.
Risk B: Psychologizing Structural Problems This is the point raised by François Dupuy. The “manager-coach” risk is turning an organizational problem into a personal one. If an employee can’t manage because processes are incoherent, the manager-coach will try to work on “their stress management” or “their leadership.” We treat the individual to avoid treating the system. It’s institutional violence disguised as benevolence.
Risk C: Intrusion and Lack of Boundaries. Coaching sometimes touches the intimate, values, identity. A manager is not trained to handle what may emerge (strong emotions, private life, psychological distress). By opening the door to emotions without the deontological framework or skill to close it, the manager could play the apprentice sorcerer.
Remedies: Become a “Manager-Developer” Rather Than a Coach
Should we go back to the “corporal” manager? Absolutely not. We just need to clarify the posture. Here are the remedies to help teams grow without falling into the “manager-coach” trap.
Remedy 1: Change the Vocabulary (Manager-Developer or Mentor) Don’t call yourself a “coach.” Assume the term “Mentor” or “Manager-Developer.” The difference? The mentor transmits, guides, and assumes they have an opinion on the direction to take. The Manager-Developer is interested in skill progression, not deep psychology. This semantic clarification lowers the pressure and puts the professional framework back at the center.
Remedy 2: Support the Skill, Not the Person. This is the most effective safety limit.
- Green Zone (Manager): “How are you going to handle this negotiation? What do you need to succeed in this task?” (We work on action, doing).
- Red Zone (Pro Coach): “Why are you so afraid of conflict? What does that say about your relationship to authority?” (We touch being).
The manager must stay in the green zone: performance and skill coaching. As soon as we slide toward identity or psychological blockage, pass the hand.
Remedy 3: Externalization (Tripartite Contract). If an employee has a real coaching need (posture problem, deep relational blockage), the only healthy response is to call on a third party. That’s where professional coaching makes full sense. An external coach (or internal if unavoidable, but from another department) offers the neutrality space the manager cannot. The manager is involved at the beginning (to set objectives) and end (to note results), but does not interfere in the process.
Remedy 4: High Posture on Framework, Low on Content. To avoid manipulation, the manager must be clear on expectations (Framework is non-negotiable) but open on how to get there (Content belongs to the employee). “The file must be delivered Friday (Framework). I don’t know how you’ll organize yourself, but I’m here if you want to think about your method together (Development posture).” This is where active listening is useful, not to psychoanalyze, but to make the employee an actor in their solution within company constraints.
Distributed Leadership: No, It’s Not “Everyone Decides”
If the manager is neither a guru (Leader) nor a therapist (Coach), what remains?
What remains is organizing collective intelligence. I borrow a pivotal phrase here:
“In a distributed organization, the manager is no longer the one who decides for, but the one who makes decisions possible.”
Distributed leadership (theorized by James P. Spillane), is not a posture, it’s a framework. A framework clear enough for the capacity to decide, orient, and learn to circulate where it is most relevant. It appears where necessary. If a complex technical decision must be made, leadership slides to the expert. If a budgetary decision, to the manager. The manager’s role is no longer to capture this leadership (“I’m the boss so I decide”), but to organize its circulation. He must accept that power is where competence and relevant information are (Crozier’s zones of uncertainty), not where the rank is.
The Manager’s True Role: The Direction – Framework – Climate Triptych
To escape the hero myth, I propose returning to a system architect role. I summarize this demanding role in three words: Direction, Framework, Climate.
Direction: “Here’s what matters now”
The manager doesn’t need to be a visionary every morning. He must be a translator. He must give a clear enough hierarchy of priorities for teams to arbitrate locally in the face of paradoxical injunctions. When everything is urgent, nothing is: it’s up to the manager to cut these knots.
Framework: “Here’s how we decide”
This is the response to the “laziness” denounced by Dupuy. Setting a framework is not adding another bureaucratic procedure. It’s defining the real rules of the game:
- Who decides what? (Autonomy perimeter)
- When to consult?
- How to handle disagreements?
I call it “tooled trust.” Trust is not decreed, it is built because interaction rules are explicit.
Climate: “Can we tell the truth here?”
If the organization is a world where “no one tells the truth to anyone” out of fear of reprisals, it is heading for disaster. The manager is the guardian of psychological safety (Amy Edmondson). He must create a climate where raising a problem (reality) is not seen as disloyalty.
The Essential Turn for HR: Stop “Fixing” Individuals
This is where my critique joins that of Lost in Management (François Dupuy’s book). Faced with systemic dysfunctions, companies’ reflex is often to “change people.” We send managers to “Benevolent Leadership,” “Non-Violent Communication,” or “Coach Posture” training. These trainings help reduce psychosocial risks short-term. But they remain a band-aid: we change individual behaviors without touching the structures that condition them. François Dupuy says it well: “We don’t change behaviors by decree or training, we change them by modifying the context.” You can train a manager in active listening for three days. If, back at the office, their individual objectives system puts them in competition with colleagues and their reporting tool takes 30% of their time, they won’t change. They’ll just be more cynical. For us organizational coaches, the challenge is to shift investment: less off-ground behavioral training, more work on organizational design. Helping a manager today is not teaching them charisma or playing psychologist. It’s helping them analyze their team’s real work, understand the constraints weighing on it, and act on the system to lift them.
From Heroism to Architecture
So, should the manager be a Leader, a Coach?
If we mean by that an exemplary, charismatic figure, constantly “carrier,” charged with compensating alone for the organization’s inconsistencies with their personal energy, then the answer is no. This model, even when starting from good intentions, often ends up putting excessive pressure on the manager… and reducing teams’ real autonomy. If we mean the one who builds the conditions allowing leadership to circulate and individuals to grow, then yes. But in that case, the right word is neither “leader” nor “coach.” It’s rather an architect or a system gardener: the one who prepares the ground, clarifies the rules, sets landmarks, and creates learning loops that make the collective capable.
