We are appointed Harbinger, chief councilor and arbitrator. Other factions have one leader who directs the activities of a guild. The Harbinger is not an official leader in this sense.
We continue to receive jobs after we are Harbinger because of Radiant quest technology. This has its good side and its bad side. In previous games, guild lines tended to stop dead after we finished all of the guild's quests. This was not ideal either, in my opinion.
Frankly I am against the idea of our characters assuming the leadership of guilds. Handing the leadership of a guild over to the newest member of the guild has never made any sense to me.
Besides, I want to play adventurers, not bureaucrats.
Superb answer by Pseron Wyrd. I concur completely.
I agree completely. I wish there was some way to permanently become the guilds fixer so to speak instead of it leader. The guild leader should really be leading not adventuring and that's not what I want to do. It would be nice to have an option to decline at least.
This, especially the bolded bit.
Perhaps if more explanation were offered in-game to the fact that the Harbinger is, at the most, the first amongst equals, and as duty bound to the ethos of the Companions as any of the other members, it might seem more sensible. Even so, the Companions have become possibly my favorite faction, and largely because of the equality amongst members. In almost every instance, all my characters have joined the Companions first, and finish the Companions questline right away.
Would love it better if Aela moved into the Harbinger's quarters upon marriage (or if you moved into hers after marriage, if you're not the Harbinger). Even so, anymore it's Companions FTW
Was there not? They clearly made it obvious that he was not the leader, I always considered him the guy that people went to for suggestions rather than orders.
There is, but the OP seems a bit confused, so I tend to wonder that maybe it lacked enough full clarification in game, in the sense that the equality of the Companions amongst each other is spoken of, but not really hammered home.
That's true, it wasn't really slap-you-in-the-face explained, and with only a couple of missed or overheard dialogues, one would easily assume he's the guild master.