Much of what is envisioned for leadership focuses primarily on the leader. Optimal leaders are seen to be those who achieve desirable outcomes. They ‘maximize,’ ‘empower,’ and ‘utilize.’ They produce results, meet goals, and improve performance. Alternatively, optimal leaders are seen to be those of positive character. They are ‘visionary,’ ‘disciplined,’ ‘ethical,’ ‘trustworthy,’ ‘encouraging’ and ‘inspiring.’ Whether about producing outcomes or developing character, the leader tends to be both the subject and the object of the conversation. Leadership that is only utilitarian is devoid of character. Character that is devoid of outcomes is not leadership.

A more fulsome picture of leadership is needed, one that is both broad enough to give scope to the facets of character, but which can also reveal the distinctive, productive outcomes of leadership practices. A more fulsome view of leadership must include not only the leader, but must pull back to include in the picture the system of which the leader is part. Leadership operates within systems. Leadership generates and moderates the climate of the system.

Seminal thinker in family therapy, Dr. Murray Bowen developed a new paradigm in therapy. Rather than encouraging analysis or focus on an individual, Bowen observed that individuals function relationally within systems, whether the system be a marriage, a family, a congregation, a town or even a country. The health of the relational functioning of the system is both determined by and affected by those within the system. Given that an individual’s primary system is the family, Bowen’s work became known as ‘Family Systems Theory.’ Family Systems Theory asserts that human beings function in relationship to one another. When people come together, they interact and influence one another and affect one another’s behaviours. These interactions are objectively observable, revealing the functioning of the system.

Edwin Friedman, a rabbi, therapist, and leadership consultant was heavily influenced and studied with Bowen. Observing families as a therapist, working with congregations as a leadership consultant, he began to appreciate ‘the wide-ranging systemic power of leadership’ and that the functioning of leaders affected the system they led on a far more fundamental level than could be accounted for in mechanistic or personality models of leadership. Leaders, Friedman says, are the immune system of their institution. Leaders determine health in a system. What counts is presence and being, not technique and know-how. Leaders model and promote the patterns of relational function that determine the climate of a relational system. Leaders are responsible for climate.

As Friedman worked with families and congregations he observed that the single variable that distinguished systems that survived and flourished from those that disintegrated was what he called a ‘well-differentiated leader.’ A well-differentiated individual is able to define herself, control himself, to become a more responsible person, and is able to permit others to be themselves. It is an ability to be connected to others, but not be reactively determined by them. A leader who is well-differentiated, through the wide-ranging systemic power of leadership will engender a climate of health. Looking at leadership means thinking about the functioning of the system.