Explore the relationship between leadership and teamwork. Learn why effective organisations need both and how to develop skills in each area.
Written by Laura Bouttell • Thu 22nd January 2026
Leadership or teamwork—which matters more? This question presents a false dichotomy that misleads executives and organisations alike. Research from the Centre for Creative Leadership reveals that the most effective organisations score highly on both leadership capability and team effectiveness, with neither able to compensate for deficiencies in the other. Rather than competing priorities, leadership and teamwork function as complementary forces that together drive organisational performance.
This guide explores the relationship between leadership and teamwork and why effective organisations need both.
Leadership and teamwork are distinct but interdependent organisational capabilities. Leadership involves influencing others towards shared goals, whilst teamwork involves collective effort towards those goals. The difference lies in focus—leadership emphasises direction and influence, teamwork emphasises collaboration and execution.
Defining characteristics:
Leadership: The process of influencing individuals or groups to achieve objectives. Leaders set direction, build commitment, and create conditions for success.
Teamwork: The collaborative effort of group members working together effectively towards common goals. Teams coordinate, share responsibility, and leverage diverse skills.
Key distinctions:
| Aspect | Leadership | Teamwork |
|---|---|---|
| Primary focus | Direction and influence | Collaboration and execution |
| Key question | Where are we going? | How do we work together? |
| Core skill | Vision and persuasion | Cooperation and coordination |
| Orientation | Strategic | Operational |
| Accountability | Individual (the leader) | Collective (the team) |
The interdependence:
Leadership without teamwork produces direction without execution. Teamwork without leadership produces activity without direction. Neither alone creates sustained organisational success.
This question typically arises in specific contexts that reveal underlying concerns about organisational priorities.
Common contexts:
Hiring decisions: Recruiters asking whether to prioritise leadership potential or team collaboration skills in candidates.
Personal development: Individuals wondering whether to develop leadership capabilities or teamwork skills first.
Organisational design: Executives debating whether to emphasise strong individual leaders or high-performing teams.
Resource allocation: Training departments deciding whether to invest in leadership development or team building.
Performance evaluation: Managers assessing whether to reward individual leadership or team contribution.
The underlying tension:
The question often reflects a perceived competition for attention, resources, or recognition between individual achievement (leadership) and collective achievement (teamwork).
Leadership provides unique contributions that teams, however effective, cannot generate from collective process alone.
Distinctive leadership contributions:
Direction setting: Someone must determine where the organisation or team should go. This strategic function requires individual judgment and decision-making that cannot emerge from committee.
Integration: Leaders integrate diverse perspectives, conflicting priorities, and competing demands into coherent action. This synthesis function requires singular accountability.
Representation: Organisations need individuals who can represent them externally, make commitments, and be accountable for performance.
Difficult decisions: Some decisions are too difficult, too urgent, or too contentious for collective process. Leaders make calls when consensus is impossible or impractical.
Inspiration: Whilst teams can motivate members, visionary inspiration often requires individual leadership that articulates possibility beyond current reality.
The irreplaceable leader:
Consider the orchestra without a conductor. Each musician may be technically excellent, and they may coordinate well. But without someone to set tempo, balance sections, and interpret the composition, the ensemble lacks unified artistic direction.
Certain situations elevate the importance of leadership relative to teamwork.
Leadership-critical situations:
Crisis response: Emergencies require rapid decision-making, clear direction, and unified action. Extended team deliberation is impossible when immediate response is essential.
Strategic inflection: Major directional changes—entering new markets, fundamental business model shifts, mergers and acquisitions—require leadership vision and commitment that precedes team buy-in.
Conflict resolution: When teams cannot resolve internal conflicts, leadership intervention becomes necessary to restore function.
External representation: Negotiations, partnerships, and stakeholder management often require individual leaders who can speak with authority.
Cultural transformation: Changing organisational culture requires visible leadership commitment that models new behaviours before teams can adopt them.
Contextual assessment:
| Situation | Leadership Priority | Teamwork Priority |
|---|---|---|
| Crisis | Very high | Moderate |
| Steady state | Moderate | Very high |
| Innovation | High | High |
| Execution | Moderate | Very high |
| Change | Very high | High |
Teamwork provides distinctive benefits that even excellent individual leadership cannot replicate.
Distinctive teamwork contributions:
Diverse perspectives: Teams bring multiple viewpoints, experiences, and expertise that no individual leader can possess. This cognitive diversity improves problem-solving and decision quality.
Execution capacity: Complex work requires coordinated effort from multiple people. Leaders can direct but cannot single-handedly execute at scale.
Resilience: Teams provide redundancy—if one member is unavailable, others can compensate. Leadership concentrated in one individual creates vulnerability.
Collective intelligence: Well-functioning teams generate ideas and solutions superior to any individual contribution through synergistic interaction.
Mutual accountability: Teams create peer accountability that often proves more effective than hierarchical oversight. Members hold each other to standards.
The irreplaceable team:
Consider the captain who can navigate brilliantly but cannot simultaneously helm, adjust sails, manage cargo, and maintain the vessel. Even the most capable leader requires a functioning crew.
Certain situations elevate the importance of teamwork relative to individual leadership.
Teamwork-critical situations:
Complex execution: Implementing sophisticated initiatives requires coordinated effort across multiple specialists. No leader can personally execute complexity.
Innovation and creativity: Breakthrough innovation typically emerges from team interaction rather than individual genius. Diverse perspectives spark novel combinations.
Sustained performance: Consistent operational excellence depends on reliable team execution day after day. Heroic individual effort is unsustainable.
Knowledge integration: Complex problems requiring multiple disciplines need teams that can integrate diverse expertise into coherent solutions.
Employee engagement: Team experience significantly shapes employee satisfaction and retention. Positive team dynamics create the daily work experience that keeps people committed.
Situational analysis:
High teamwork priority:
High leadership priority:
Rather than competing, leadership and teamwork function as complementary capabilities that together create organisational effectiveness.
Complementary dynamics:
Direction and execution: Leadership provides direction; teamwork provides execution. Without direction, execution lacks purpose. Without execution, direction remains unrealised.
Vision and capability: Leaders articulate what's possible; teams develop the capability to achieve it. Vision without capability frustrates. Capability without vision underperforms.
Accountability and collaboration: Leadership creates clear accountability; teamwork enables collaboration. Accountability without collaboration isolates. Collaboration without accountability diffuses.
Challenge and support: Leaders challenge teams to achieve more; teams support each other through difficulties. Challenge without support overwhelms. Support without challenge plateaus.
The synthesis:
Like the warp and weft of a fabric, leadership and teamwork weave together to create organisational strength neither could achieve alone.
The integration of leadership and teamwork appears most clearly in team leadership—the practice of leading teams effectively.
Team leadership components:
Setting direction: Effective team leaders establish clear purpose, goals, and priorities that align team effort.
Building the team: Leaders select, develop, and when necessary replace team members to create capable, complementary groups.
Creating conditions: Leaders establish structures, processes, and resources that enable team effectiveness.
Facilitating process: Leaders guide team dynamics, ensuring productive conflict, balanced participation, and effective decision-making.
Managing boundaries: Leaders represent teams to external stakeholders and protect teams from inappropriate interference.
Coaching and developing: Leaders develop both individual capabilities and collective team capacity.
Team leadership framework:
| Function | Leadership Aspect | Teamwork Aspect |
|---|---|---|
| Direction | Setting goals | Aligning effort |
| Composition | Selecting members | Building relationships |
| Structure | Designing process | Executing together |
| Dynamics | Facilitating interaction | Collaborating effectively |
| External | Representing team | Supporting representation |
| Development | Coaching individuals | Peer learning |
Effective professionals need both leadership and teamwork capabilities, and both can be developed.
Developing leadership:
Seek influence opportunities: Take initiative on projects, volunteer to lead initiatives, and practice influencing without authority.
Study leadership: Read leadership literature, observe effective leaders, and analyse what makes their approaches work.
Get feedback: Seek input on your influence and direction-setting. Understanding how others experience your leadership enables improvement.
Build strategic thinking: Develop ability to see beyond immediate tasks to broader patterns and longer-term implications.
Practice communication: Leadership requires articulating vision, explaining decisions, and inspiring commitment. Develop these communication capabilities.
Developing teamwork:
Contribute reliably: Fulfil commitments consistently. Reliability builds the trust that enables team effectiveness.
Collaborate actively: Seek opportunities to work with others. Learn to coordinate, share credit, and leverage diverse strengths.
Manage conflict productively: Develop ability to engage disagreement constructively rather than avoiding or escalating it.
Support teammates: Help others succeed. Team orientation means prioritising collective achievement over individual recognition.
Practice listening: Effective teamwork requires genuine understanding of others' perspectives. Develop deep listening capability.
Development approach:
Neither leadership nor teamwork skills develop through study alone—both require practice. Seek opportunities to exercise both capabilities regularly.
Organisations can systematically develop both leadership capability and team effectiveness.
Organisational development strategies:
Balanced investment: Invest in both leadership development and team building. Neither should monopolise development resources.
Leadership pipeline: Develop leaders at all levels, not just senior positions. Leadership capability throughout the organisation enables agility.
Team structures: Design work to require team collaboration. Structure creates opportunity for teamwork development through practice.
Assessment systems: Evaluate both individual leadership and team contribution. What gets measured signals what matters.
Recognition programmes: Recognise both leadership achievement and team success. Balanced recognition reinforces both priorities.
Development integration:
Sequential development: Some organisations develop teamwork skills first (early career), then leadership skills (advancing career). This sequence builds foundation before elevation.
Integrated development: Others develop both simultaneously, recognising that effective professionals need both throughout their careers.
Situational development: Still others develop whichever capability is most needed for current role, recognising different positions emphasise different skills.
This question presents a false choice. The most effective professionals demonstrate both capabilities, adjusting emphasis based on situation. A complete professional can lead when leadership is needed and contribute as team member when that's appropriate.
The integrated professional:
Leadership mode: When direction is unclear, when someone must make decisions, when external representation is needed—step into leadership.
Teamwork mode: When collective execution is needed, when others are leading effectively, when diverse contribution matters most—contribute as team member.
Adaptive mode: Most situations require fluid movement between leadership and teamwork roles. Rigid identification with either limits effectiveness.
Career implications:
Professionals who demonstrate only leadership often struggle with collaboration and implementation. Those who demonstrate only teamwork may be overlooked for advancement opportunities. Career success typically requires demonstrated capability in both.
These questions reveal assumptions that leadership requires extraversion and that leaders cannot also be team members.
Debunking myths:
Introverted leadership: Research shows no correlation between extraversion and leadership effectiveness. Introverted leaders often excel at deep listening, thoughtful decision-making, and creating space for team contribution.
Leaders as team members: Effective leaders regularly function as team members in contexts where others lead. Senior executives are team members on their executive teams. Departmental leaders are team members in cross-functional initiatives.
The reality:
Effective leadership and teamwork both accommodate diverse personality types. Neither requires extraversion, charisma, or particular personality characteristics.
Self-managed teams can function effectively, but rarely without leadership entirely. What changes is how leadership is distributed.
Rotating leadership: Different members lead in different situations based on expertise and context.
Shared leadership: Leadership functions distribute across members rather than concentrating in one person.
Emergent leadership: Leadership arises naturally from interaction rather than formal assignment.
Essential leadership functions:
Even in self-managed teams, certain leadership functions must occur:
The question is not whether leadership happens but how it's distributed and who exercises it.
The combination of strong leadership and effective teamwork creates powerful organisational units.
Characteristics of well-led teams:
Clear direction: Members understand purpose, goals, and priorities. Leadership has provided meaningful direction that aligns effort.
Complementary composition: The team includes diverse skills and perspectives that complement each other. Leadership has built the right team.
Healthy dynamics: Members interact productively—engaging conflict constructively, sharing information openly, supporting each other. Leadership has cultivated healthy team culture.
Strong execution: The team delivers results reliably. Both leadership direction and team capability translate into performance.
Continuous improvement: The team learns and develops over time. Leadership facilitates growth whilst team members commit to improvement.
Leadership-teamwork synergy:
| Leadership Contribution | Teamwork Contribution | Combined Outcome |
|---|---|---|
| Clear vision | Aligned effort | Purposeful action |
| Right people | Strong relationships | Cohesive unit |
| Good structure | Effective process | Efficient execution |
| Boundary management | Internal focus | Protected productivity |
| Development focus | Mutual learning | Growing capability |
Comprehensive assessment examines both individual leadership capability and collective team effectiveness.
Assessing leadership:
360-degree feedback: Gather input from supervisors, peers, and direct reports on leadership behaviours and impact.
Performance outcomes: Evaluate results achieved through leadership—team performance, goal achievement, talent development.
Leadership competencies: Assess against defined leadership capabilities—strategic thinking, influencing, developing others.
Potential indicators: Identify markers of future leadership capability—learning agility, ambition, self-awareness.
Assessing teamwork:
Team performance: Evaluate collective results—project outcomes, quality metrics, productivity measures.
Team dynamics: Assess interaction quality—communication, conflict management, collaboration patterns.
Member contribution: Evaluate individual contribution to team success—reliability, collaboration, support.
Team health: Measure engagement, satisfaction, and sustainability of team function.
Integrated assessment:
Effective organisations assess both dimensions and seek professionals who demonstrate capability in each.
Neither leadership nor teamwork is universally more important—both are essential. Leadership provides direction, integration, and accountability. Teamwork provides execution, diverse perspectives, and collective capability. The most effective organisations develop both, recognising that leadership without teamwork produces direction without execution, whilst teamwork without leadership produces activity without direction.
Teamwork can occur with distributed rather than concentrated leadership, but rarely without leadership functions entirely. Someone must clarify goals, make decisions, and resolve conflicts. In self-managed teams, these leadership functions distribute across members rather than residing in one person. The question is how leadership is exercised, not whether it exists.
Both leadership and teamwork require communication, problem-solving, and emotional intelligence. Leaders and team members both need to communicate clearly, work through challenges, and understand others. The application differs—leaders emphasise influence and direction, team members emphasise collaboration and coordination—but foundational skills overlap significantly.
Develop leadership through taking initiative, seeking influence opportunities, and practising direction-setting. Develop teamwork through reliable contribution, active collaboration, and supporting teammates. Both require practice—seek opportunities to exercise both capabilities regularly. Neither develops through study alone; real experience in both roles builds genuine capability.
Team leadership is indeed a teamwork skill—the ability to guide team dynamics, facilitate productive interaction, and create conditions for team success. However, leadership more broadly extends beyond teamwork to include individual influence, strategic direction, and organisational representation. Leadership and teamwork overlap but are not identical.
The question implies you must choose between leadership and teamwork, when effective professionals and organisations need both. This false dichotomy can lead to underinvestment in one capability, overemphasis on the other, and failure to develop the integration that creates organisational effectiveness. Better questions ask how to develop both and how they work together.
Effective leaders regularly function as team players. Senior executives are team members on their leadership teams. Departmental leaders contribute as team members in cross-functional initiatives. The ability to shift between leading and contributing demonstrates versatility. Leaders who cannot be team players often struggle in peer relationships and collaborative contexts.
The question "leadership or teamwork" invites a choice that effective professionals and organisations refuse to make. Like asking whether businesses need strategy or execution, the question presents as either/or what is actually both/and.
Leadership and teamwork are not competing alternatives but complementary capabilities that together create organisational success. Leaders who cannot work in teams fail to execute. Teams without leadership lack direction. Only the integration of both produces sustained high performance.
The effective professional develops both capabilities—knowing when to lead and when to contribute, when to direct and when to collaborate. The effective organisation invests in both—building leadership capability throughout whilst creating conditions for team effectiveness.
Stop asking which matters more. Start developing both.
The organisations that master this integration outperform those still debating the false choice.