Yes, strictly you only have to set the name on all of them if aiDisabled, since if the leader isn't played, then you won't get a name. Also, not completely sure what happens if the leader was being played or was AI, but died before you jipped in. In SP, you can safely just set the group name in the leader. So on some levels, I was just ensuring that this absolutely always works, rather than giving a detailed description of whether it works or not in which situation.
Sadly, I'm not aware of an easier way to ensure it. Could do it very easily if we could read the config in the SQM file (missionFileConfig is the config in description.ext, not mission.sqm), but never managed to do this. If anyone knows, then I'm all ears...