Power
In normal day-to-day life, the average adventure travel leader is a fairly powerless creature. They pay their bills, go grocery shopping, read the newspaper, and live pretty run-of-the-mill lives. Out there on the trail, it's a much different story. They're the unquestioned Masters of the Universe; disregard their advice at your peril.
When you lead your own party of adventure tourists, everything that is not an act of God or government is up to you. You plan the itinerary. You choose where to camp. You even assign the cooking, cleaning, and latrine duties (source). Believe us, this power is to be absolutely respected.
Your safety and the safety of your group comes first. It doesn't matter what Jason the Entitled Trust-Fund Adventurer wants; if you've decided that wind conditions aren't right to climb the K2 summit, then you're not climbing.
Another source of power comes from your repeated travel habits. Eventually, if you keep cutting the same trails, you'll establish a relationship with the locals. Whether it's Crazy Al's Steak Emporium, Shooting Range, and Mini-Golf Course in backwoods Texas or a ginormous yurt on the edge of the Gobi Desert, you'll want to form a two-way street with business people in the area.
Not only will you be able to show your clients something unique, you'll also appear to be that much better a navigator.
As with all leadership positions, you've also got to worry about the wellbeing of those you lead; here, that means getting 100% of your group home with as much fun as they can possibly roll into a bike ride across the Alps (which they'll expect to be a lot). If just one trip goes awry, your leadership abilities will be called into question. And trust us when we say that if no one comes back, there will probably be a lot of questions.