Contrasting to Prior Leadership Frameworks and Models
LEADS+ Development Model intersects with several other existing frameworks relevant to leadership development. However, most of these frameworks do not explicitly articulate the growth of a leader in multiple roles nor stratify their progression by the types of work they might do (e.g., within themselves, in relation to small teams, with regards to other organisations and groups, and finally in achieving systems changes or results). For instance, Heifetz’s adaptive leadership suggests that a given leader should change and adapt to their context35, but assumes that leader is at a specific stage within variable contexts and does not provide the insight around how one’s roles change over time.
Meanwhile, meta-leadership framework36–38 (developed by McNulty, Marcus and their other colleagues from Harvard) speaks to the need for leaders who can bridge multiple worlds and work together, especially in times of crisis. The meta-leadership framework was first developed from studying various emergency situations (e.g., Boston Marathon Bombing, Hurricane response) and is highly resonant with our complexity-based leadership phenotype. However, meta-leadership does not speak to the versatility of an individual to switch between various types of engagement or leadership and followership in varying contexts, nor does it compare meta-leadership with other stages of development that a leader might encounter on their professional development journey.
Numerous other leadership frameworks have multiple levels (e.g. Collins’ Good to Great five leaders levels39) or loosely describe various stages a leader may experience though their lives (e.g. Joiner & Joseph’s Leadership Agility40), but few models tend to pull together the various aspects of development into a model that expects one to manifest competencies in various domains differently.