Museums come to life when a common purpose focuses the group's activities and unites efforts. Management is the craft of achieving this purpose through people. There are four roles management has to perform in order to be successful in achieving both long and short term goals. Taken together, done excellently, these become the qualities of leadership we're all looking for in our museum executives, trustees, staff, and volunteers.

To produce results (P) for which the museum exists, satisfying needs. A crucial question for all museums is: Whose needs? This role focuses on what the museum must do to effectively fulfill those needs.

Examples: to collect, research, and educate.

Requires: Knowledge of what needs to be done and how to do it. Persistence, or drive, to see that it gets done.

To administer (A), establish, maintain systems that produce results. The focus is on how to do things to ensure the museum is efficient.

Examples: Coordinate schedules, implement policies, follow up with donors, controlling costs, hiring systems, collections management.

Requires: knowledge of the systems or plan. Attention to detail. Willingness to take corrective action.

To entrepreneur change (E) and adapt to new threats and opportunities. Focus is on what we need to do to become and remain effective (P) and efficient (A) in the future.

Examples: perceive trends, insightful vision into new ways to do things and new things to do.

Requires: Creativity, Courage, or willingness to take risks.

To integrate (I) and connect people to their work (P), to systems (A), to change (E), and to each other (I). To move the museum from a mechanistic to an organic way of thinking and operating. To synergetically interconnect all internal aspects of the museum, including external stakeholders, building energy from diversity.

Examples: Develops new people, builds teams, derives consensus, goals, and shared vision.

Requires: Sensitivity to people, moods, climates, groups processes. Positive view of human nature as fundamentally rational, creative, cooperative, and energetic.

The four roles of management were first articulated by Dr. Ichak Adizes in thousands of lectures world wide and in his book "How To Solve The Mismanagement Crises" Dow Jones Irwin 1979.