Academic excellence is brought about by effective leadership, which may encompass the concept of distributed leadership, which signifies a collective engagement. However, leadership positions within higher education are frequently filled with scholars lacking leadership skills and experience, which can be detrimental both to their performance and well-being. To address this, we explored via interviews with academic leaders how academic leadership is defined and conceptualised and what their developmental needs are. Participants (N = 23) came from junior, middle and senior management levels. Findings suggest that their notions of leadership as well as any developmental needs/activities perceived useful, differ according to their leadership level. Although junior leaders were more concerned with procedural elements of leading, senior leaders focused on mentoring, social expectations and knowledge of academia. These findings have important implications for a wider theoretical conceptualisation of academic leadership, which are typically focused on individual senior leaders. Further, our findings inform leadership development programmes, as universities' dealings with academic leaders tend not to consider the differing requirements of junior, middle and senior academic leaders.