Concluding Thoughts

In this book, we have set out to explore the challenges of leadership in today’s context of ever-increasing complexity, volatility, uncertainty and ambiguity. We have been conscious throughout that there is a vast literature that explores leadership, offers models and suggests solutions to the challenges of determining the nature and antecedents of effective leadership. In reviewing these in Chap. 6 we pointed out that the concept of ‘heroic’ leadership has dominated much of the thinking. We have also suggested that there is a demand for a simple answer that amounts to a search for the ‘Holy Grail’ of leadership. Organisations are all too often seeking relatively simple explanations and models that explain effective leadership. All too often, these ‘silver bullets’ fail to provide a basis for developing effective leadership. At the same time, the academic literature remains complicated and relatively inaccessible to practitioners. In reviewing the writing on leadership we determined from the outset that the context in which leaders find themselves today are not amenable to simple models and prescriptions for success. There is a real need, in our view, for an approach to thinking about leadership that combines the rigour applied to academic research and the relevance desired by practice.