This colloquium argues that writings on leadership in the early years commonly assume a service ethos. The aim of nurseries and other early childhood settings is to provide a service for children and their parents, and the task of leadership is seen to be to find effective ways of defining and realizing this aim. But increasingly, and especially in English-speaking countries, early years childcare and education is viewed as an industry, as a specialized and speculative business. This has had major repercussions for the operation of services, especially in England where the various intermediary levels between individual nurseries and national or state policies, which have provided opportunities for discussion and exchange of practice, and a basis for negotiated standards for leadership, have been stripped out. Processes for accountability are badly eroded. Concepts of leadership are necessarily contextual.