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Introduction
The concepts of leader and leadership development are to a large extent used interchangeably with no evident distinction made between them in literature. Most of the studies speak of leadership development, when in fact they refer to leader development and the reasons and the means through which organizations are able to develop the leadership skills of their executives. However, leadership development holds a broader meaning than simply developing the leadership skills of individual leaders, although leader development still remains a critical aspect for organizations.
This paper aims at making conceptual and practical clarifications between leader and leadership development in order to distinguish between them and capture the actual meaning of leadership development. Then it moves to investigate how organizations can or should develop leadership at all levels and proposes a collective framework for leadership development.
Leader development vs leadership development
A possible explanation for the inadequacy in distinguishing leader development from leadership development is due to the fact that the majority of the prior empirical studies of leadership examined leadership largely as an individual phenomenon, focusing on the behaviours and skills of the leader ([16] Day, 2001). Thus, leadership was expected to occur mainly as the result of training individual leaders and the development of their skills and competencies. But, as already stated, leadership is not just an individual phenomenon. It is a complex phenomenon that encompasses the interactions between the leader and the social and organizational environment (e.g. [25] House and Aditya, 1997; [48] Shamir and Howell, 1999; [56] Waldman and Yammarino, 1999; [8] Boal and Hooijberg, 2001; [26] Hunt and Dodge, 2001; [40] Osborn et al. , 2002; [55] Vera and Crossan, 2004; [57] Waldman et al. , 2004; [42] Porter and McLaughlin, 2006).
[47] Senge (1995) supports this view by arguing that the old leadership perspective was deeply individualistic and non-systemic. Under the new leadership perspective, leaders are responsible for building organizations in which people continuously expand their capacity to learn, to understand complexity and to set the vision for the organization. Likewise, [16] Day (2001) links leader development to the human capital of the organization and leadership development to the social capital of the organization. [39] O'Toole (2001, p. 163) also distinguishes leader and leadership development stating that in the...