During the 1960s John Adair was senior lecturer in military history and the Leadership Training Advisor at the Military Academy, Sandhurst, UK. Later, when assistant director of the Industrial Society, he developed what he called the action-centred leadership model, based on his experiences at Sandhurst where he had the responsibility to ensure that results in cadet training did not fall below a certain standard. He had observed that some instructors frequently achieved well above average results due to their own natural ability with groups and their enthusiasm. He developed this further into a team model which is the basis for the approach of the author and his colleagues to this subject.

In developing this model for teamwork and leadership, John Adair understood that for any group or team, big or small, to respond to leadership, they need a clearly defined task, and the response and achievement of that task is inter-related to the needs of the team, and the separate needs of the individual members of the team (Figure 10.2). The value of the overlapping circles is that it emphasizes the unity of leadership and the interdependence and multi-functional reaction to single decisions affecting any of the three areas.

Figure 10.2: Adair s model