Guide · Weighing up
In briefShared leadership brings benefits like more broadly carried decisions, mutual relief and part-time capability – and drawbacks like higher coordination effort, a blockade risk in disagreement and unclear responsibility when structure is missing. The balance decides the value.
Contents
The benefits
- Better decisions through two perspectives and fewer blind spots.
- Mutual relief – leadership becomes more bearable, even part-time.
- Higher resilience: on holiday or in illness the role stays filled.
- A role-model effect for a cooperative leadership culture.
The drawbacks
- Higher coordination effort, especially at the start.
- Blockade risk when a decision rule for disagreement is missing.
- Unclear responsibility when roles aren’t cleanly separated.
- Confusion in the team when the outward presence isn’t coordinated.
Aus meiner Praxis
Almost all drawbacks share one root: missing structure. With clear roles and a disagreement rule they don’t vanish entirely, but become manageable. Without them they reinforce each other.
When does what prevail?
Research shows: shared leadership has a positive effect on team effectiveness – but not automatically. Its value rises with the complexity of the task and the quality of collaboration. For simple tasks with clear single responsibility, the coordination effort can exceed the benefit.
The evidence is in Studies & statistics. How to keep the drawbacks small through structure is shown in Introducing shared leadership.
Frequently asked questions
Do the pros or cons prevail?
It depends on the structure. Set up well, the benefits clearly prevail; set up poorly, the drawbacks.
Is shared leadership more expensive?
Not necessarily. The extra coordination is offset by possible savings from better decisions and lower failure risk.
Sources & further reading
- Pearce, C. L. & Conger, J. A. (2003): Shared Leadership. Reframing the Hows and Whys of Leadership. Sage.
- Carson, J. B., Tesluk, P. E. & Marrone, J. A. (2007): Shared Leadership in Teams. Academy of Management Journal, 50(5), 1217–1234.
- Wang, D., Waldman, D. A. & Zhang, Z. (2014): A meta-analysis of shared leadership and team effectiveness. Journal of Applied Psychology, 99(2), 181–198.
How this article was written
This article is based on my own experience as a leader in a job-sharing model and 15 years of leading in banking, as well as the established research on shared leadership (see sources). Where I speak from practice, it is marked as such.
Amrit Rescheneder
Amrit Rescheneder helps organisations and leadership tandems build shared leadership that works. She led in a job-sharing model herself for years – after 15 years of leadership responsibility in banking. She knows shared leadership from practice, not from textbooks.
Updated: 25 July 2026