Careful not to be too democratic. One thing Project Misery Business suffered from was the case of too many chiefs not enough Indians. I made the mistake of assuming that former leaders wanted to lead and play at the intensity of their past worlds, I trusted word of mouth for players, and I promoted some top players who really had no business being there. As a result it was one massive "this way, no this way, no that way" scenario.
Having a tight leash in this regard is a good idea. In some ways I regard overstepping my authority and annoying people or rushing into things. In other ways I totally let others run the show, especially with recruitment. Which resulted in frustration when someone got kicked as 9/10 times it was someone's friend.
Here's how I think you should try leading and is how I usually approach it.
1) Enter at a time where you could be the head hancho for the first few months. Its tough to constantly stay on top of things, but during a month or two, you can easily find talented and hungry leaders willing to try for a week or so while you attend to work or school. If you can't be hands on from the get go, cancel the launch. My biggest mistake on Cythera was just going into Cythera at all. November is a bad time for college students, I entered with a tour to a prospective school, rugby training starting, a family death looming, and 4 final papers. If you can't lead at the time, don't make the assumption that others will gladly do it for you.
2) Limit the chiefs in the tribe. No matter what, it is never a good idea to promote experienced leaders and assume it'll work out fine. Too many people will quickly become unproductive and once the damage is done you tend to have a hard time reversing it as many people will be mad if demoted even if its impersonal.
3) Make it clear to everyone there that you grow or get booted or internalized. Only recruit people who have no issue with that happening to their friend. Again, this is a very impersonal process. Sometimes people can't hang but still try.
4) Hold off on in game recruitment for a bit if you use a premade. Only really look into players who are either proven on another world or show exceptional promise. Depth is important, but early on you will have high talent and replacing that will not have to be immediate.
5) Have a game plan for where ever you land. We got wedged between Deathwish, Boilermarc, and Digital Mystics. All of these players are exceptional leaders. Because of my many absences, we never developed a game plan that was effective enough to do more than take a few towns and city swap. While we could have held out for a long while, this isn't good enough to team mates who came expecting more. Making an organized plan is very important.
6) Democracy, as supafletch said, democracy is needed. Players should have control both on a leadership and regular level. One thing you can't do is lean to far to either side of the spectrum. Every major issue regarding the alliance should be discussed at a leadership level. On a regular level control can be free days to claim towns with no impending ops or assigned targets, a fun contest involving a temporary alliance name change, etc.
These are just some suggestions that I have to offer. They come from lessons I learned over the years.
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