Purpose – To explore the requirements for learning distributed leadership. drawing on cultural historical activity theory (CHAT). Design/methodology/approach – The background to recent leadership research that distinguishes between leading as a quality of one person, the appointed leader,...

Purpose – The second paper in a two‐paper series, this article seeks to consider how the ideas of cultural historical activity theory were used in a learning programme for managers to examine and apply leadership as a collective phenomenon usually referred to as distributed leadership....