Leadership theory

INTRODUCTION

Welcome to this report which was commissioned to assist development of the new National Occupational Standards in Management and Leadership.

It draws together a range of materials detailing approaches to leadership, leadership development and leadership/management competency frameworks in a wide range of organisations. Much of this material is sensitive in nature so we request that it is treated with care and not copied or distributed without our permission.

The purpose of the report is not to propose a framework of standards for providing direction in organisations, but to draw together a diverse yet comprehensive set of information to act as a reference for those charged with this task.

The material provided is intended to contribute towards the “Providing direction” part of the framework, including “Developing a vision for the future”, “Gaining commitment and providing leadership” and “Providing governance” and as such, some other core activities and responsibilities of leaders and managers may be omitted.

This report acts very much as a “first step” towards the development of a new set of occupational standards and it is intended that its results should lead directly into further fieldwork, discussion and consultation.

Leadership is a complex process and we have serious reservations over the extent to which a set of standards, qualities or competencies can ever fully capture the nature of what makes some leaders/organisations successful and others unsuccessful. These concerns are voiced in Section 8.

Finally, we would like to thank all those who helped contribute towards the development of this report, particularly Geoff Carroll of Chase Consulting who initiated the project and Alan Hooper, Peter Wilkinson and Martin Wood for their comments. Special thanks also goes to those representatives from the organisations who were kind enough to contribute their frameworks to this report.

Centre for Leadership Studies, May 2003.

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