No Man(ager) is an Island: For a process-oriented systems approach to leadership

Leader-centric models have demonstrated remarkable resilience in the face of ongoing challenges. Though trait theories of leadership are no longer fashionable, contextual models still struggle to escape from the lingering influence of the transformational leader. Even process-oriented approaches have not consistently offered a meaningful alternative, as the figure of the transformational leader retains its paradigmatic centrality. This paper evaluates the staying power of the transformational leader, showing how and why core tenets of now-obsolete models persist beyond their time. It advocates for a process-oriented, systems-based approach to leadership, in which the leader and context are not pre-formed inputs but co-constitutive elements of the leadership system. Seen through this lens, rather than merely responding to context, the leader is bound up in a totalizing leadership system irreducible to the leader-as-individuated-subject or their actions. By divesting both leaders and contexts of ontological primacy, researchers might escape both the overemphasis on individual leaders and the trap of contextual determinism. A process-oriented approach, informed by systems theory, may help move beyond heroic notions of leadership and develop more useful concepts.