Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2025
Abstract
Legacy leadership models continue to dominate universities, leadership programs, and organizational development curricula. Frameworks such as the Four Colors typology, the Competing Values Framework (CVF), the Four Frames, and related personality- or quadrant-based theories were designed during a predigital era characterized by stability, linearity, and predictable organizational boundaries. However, the contemporary reality of leadership is radically different: leaders now operate within volatile, digitalized, AI-mediated, globally entangled supply value chain ecosystems. This paper proposes that legacy leadership frameworks are theoretically insufficient, structurally misaligned, and operationally outdated for developing leaders in twenty-first-century organizations. Drawing on systems thinking, digital transformation research, organizational complexity, and supply value chain theory, the paper presents a critique of these models and proposes the need for post-digital, system-centric frameworks capable of addressing nonlinear, interdependent, real-time organizational challenges. The article also provides a reflexive analysis of classic defense reactions encountered in academic discourse when challenging legacy models, illustrating how academic socialization and theoretical attachment inhibit paradigm advancement and application. The paper concludes by outlining characteristics essential for nextgeneration leadership development frameworks.
Recommended Citation
Sells, J, "Beyond Legacy Leadership Models: Reframing Organizational Development for a Post-Digital, Systemic Era" (2025). College of Arts and Cultural Studies. 3.
https://digitalshowcase.oru.edu/acs/3
