who wants to work for a leader who is neither powerful nor high-status within their own company?

Me. In my limited experience, the more leaders are involved, the less likely the project is to be successful. The ideal situation is having leadership that is able to set a decent strategy, and then get out of the way of their subordinates and let them execute. Bad leadership micromanages and inserts themselves in the way of execution.

The status and “power” involved in setting strategy isn’t nearly as significant as the amount involved in micromanagement.