Lead­er­ship Devel­op­ment And Why Your Orga­ni­za­tion Needs It

Inspired leaders. Inspired workforce. 

Lead­er­ship devel­op­ment has become a neces­sary focus for any orga­ni­za­tion that wishes to sepa­rate itself from the pack and become estab­lished in markets that are always changing the rules. 

Leaders must have the capacity to do so many things. While it can be tempting to wait 20 years for this to happen in a ‘trial and error’ type of expe­ri­ence, orga­ni­za­tions that are forward-thinking can struc­ture lead­er­ship devel­op­ment into their plan to culti­vate very specific lead­er­ship skillsets. This massively stream­lines the process and actively prepares orga­ni­za­tional leaders to do an excel­lent job leading teams and inspiring high levels of productivity.

But first, let’s have a look at what Lead­er­ship Devel­op­ment is.

What is Lead­er­ship Development?

Lead­er­ship devel­op­ment is the active process of culti­vating the neces­sary traits, skills, confi­dence and prac­tical knowl­edge in indi­vid­uals wishing to pursue lead­er­ship posi­tions. It gener­ally applies to the skills an indi­vidual needs to manage teams effectively. 

Orga­ni­za­tions have the option to prepare high caliber indi­vid­uals to take over lead­er­ship posi­tions within the company by giving them the tools they need to manage teams. 

This is a great step­ping stone. Many compa­nies have internal mech­a­nisms to iden­tify and nurture indi­vid­uals to prepare them for chal­lenging manage­ment roles; exam­ples include fast track schemes and schemes for univer­sity and college graduates.

What is Leader Development?

Leader devel­op­ment is a comple­men­tary facet of lead­er­ship devel­op­ment. Close in name, different in appli­ca­tion. Lead­er­ship devel­op­ment focuses on the external manage­ment of teams. Leader devel­op­ment focuses on the internal and personal devel­op­ment of the indi­vidual leader

It focuses on chal­lenging the internal mech­a­nisms that allow people to become the best leaders they can be. In this inward-facing context, a person can be chal­lenged to think crit­i­cally about their levels of self-disci­pline, their manage­ment style, and their emotional intel­li­gence

All lead­er­ship programs will likely touch on this but the best programs will incor­po­rate these two elements together to create trans­for­ma­tional leaders that are prepared for what they will face from within and from without.

What Are The Bene­fits of Devel­oping Leaders?

Devel­oping people is a costly task. It takes a lot of time and resources. In the begin­ning stages, it can be diffi­cult to quan­tify any posi­tive impact or get a clear picture of what the ROI is. So why invest?

Increased Produc­tivity

Accom­plished and effec­tive leaders know how to inspire their teams and increase the creativity and produc­tivity levels that will ulti­mately improve that bottom line. Leaders increase produc­tivity when they know how to create a clear roadmap for their team to follow. 

This compe­tency is one among many others that lead­er­ship devel­op­ment programs help to cultivate.

Talent Reten­tion

Orga­ni­za­tions with a clear lead­er­ship devel­op­ment program struc­ture are more likely to retain the world-class talent they’ve invested huge amounts of time and effort into bringing in. 

A clear way to progress is a feature that high-quality leaders-in-waiting are looking for in their careers. If there are no oppor­tu­ni­ties to develop, staff turnover is likely to increase — your best talent will not be content to sit in a flat struc­ture in a junior posi­tion forever. 

The very nature of global leaders means that as soon as possible, they are going to want to make a posi­tive differ­ence in the lives of their customers and colleagues. They’ll stick around if they know that there’s a clear way for them to do this.

In addi­tion to this, poor manage­ment will cause you to hemor­rhage talent like you’ve never seen. If you’ve got great people running out the door, check out those who are leading. Orga­ni­za­tions that teach their leaders how to value their teams will find that turnover drops signif­i­cantly, leaving more time to get on with those projects that will make a real differ­ence to customers.

Improved Orga­ni­za­tion Culture

Investing in your employees helps to create a culture where employees will want to invest in the strategic aims of the busi­ness. A company’s rela­tion­ship with its employees should be a symbi­otic rela­tion­ship where both parties feed into the overall devel­op­ment of the business. 

Lead­er­ship devel­op­ment programs are one of the many ways orga­ni­za­tions can use to create this kind of dynamic.

Increased Organ­i­sa­tional Agility

When a company invests the time to train leaders, you give people the tools they need to confi­dently respond to changing circum­stances. If your leaders have a very limited skill set, they will be far less likely to be able to inno­vate in a different context. 

This will slow your busi­ness down and cause a lot of frus­tra­tion within the teams. Adapt­ability in a busi­ness envi­ron­ment that’s in a constant state of flux is a strength you cannot afford to be without in today’s climate.

Why is Lead­er­ship Devel­op­ment Impor­tant in a Global Context?

Global lead­er­ship expert Joyce Osland describes global lead­er­ship as “extreme lead­er­ship”. What­ever your expec­ta­tions of domestic leaders are, you can 10x that when compared with the things expected of global leaders. The chal­lenges multiply and leaders wishing to enter this arena need to be prepared in a different way to their domestic peers.

In a global context, lead­er­ship devel­op­ment programs need to take into account the constantly changing demands of an orga­ni­za­tion that oper­ates in a global market. Layers of complexity that arise for global leaders like dealing with different cultures, deter­mining how much is phys­i­cally required in terms of face-to-face contact with teams across nations, and culti­vating having the internal traits and skills to deal with all of these things is no mean feat. Domestic leaders would do very well to have a lead­er­ship devel­op­ment program in place. For global leaders in global orga­ni­za­tions, it’s imperative.

How can you go about Devel­oping Global Leaders?

Having discussed what lead­er­ship devel­op­ment is and why, as an orga­ni­za­tion, you stand to gain so much from investing, it’s time to look at ways you can go about building an exec­u­tive devel­op­ment program.

Internal Training Programs

Lead­er­ship tasks vary between orga­ni­za­tions. If you want to stan­dardize manage­ment prac­tices that are tailored specif­i­cally to the needs of your organ­i­sa­tion then this might be a way to go. Context is exceed­ingly impor­tant when creating a program, so if you’ve got the budget to develop a compre­hen­sive program in-house, this will go a long way to producing great leaders in the company. At this point, you can prop­erly prepare leaders for chal­lenges specific to the market envi­ron­ment you operate in.

A con of doing this is that it’s incred­ibly costly and time-consuming to set up. There is also an element of trial and error; you defi­nitely don’t want to invest lots of resources for the lead­er­ship program to fail in its aim to draw out the next gener­a­tion of company leaders. To avoid this, it is a good idea to at least consult with estab­lished lead­er­ship devel­op­ment programs. That way you can customize the program and even get it accredited.

External Lead­er­ship Devel­op­ment Programs

If it’s not viable for you to create a program in-house at this stage, you could find an accred­ited busi­ness school program to enroll future leaders in. Lots of univer­si­ties do programs that can be done whilst remaining at work. Upon comple­tion, the employee would get an accred­ited qual­i­fi­ca­tion that they could add to their portfolio.

A word of caution here; not all lead­er­ship devel­op­ment programs are created equal. Ensure that the lead­er­ship devel­op­ment program you choose adequately prepares your leaders. If you know that the lead­er­ship roles within your busi­ness require a global outlook, then a course that focuses on a more domestic style of lead­er­ship will not be suffi­cient no matter how much you pay.

Find out more about what you should be looking for in a program to develop global busi­ness leaders here.

Mentor­ship

This style of lead­er­ship devel­op­ment is invalu­able, espe­cially if you have lots of leaders with plenty of knowl­edge and expe­ri­ence to pass on. If a completely compre­hen­sive program seems a bit of an overkill for what you need right now, then mentoring is a fantastic tool to help coach more confi­dent and compe­tent leaders.

If there are people within the orga­ni­za­tion who could fulfill this role, it makes for a really rewarding dynamic, where hints, tips, and tricks can be passed along through each gener­a­tion of company leaders. This is all well and good, as long as you aren’t trying to change a toxic orga­ni­za­tional culture; if you aren’t happy with the perfor­mance of managers at this point, it’s defi­nitely not wise to repli­cate what they’re doing.

If that’s the case then getting some external input will be your best bet. It’s a great way to expand the vision of your future leaders as well and give them access to fresh ideas and new ways of doing business.

Global Lead­er­ship Devel­op­ment With EURAC

However you decide to proceed, what is clear is that orga­ni­za­tions succeed when they have excel­lent leaders to drive that success forward. Investing in lead­er­ship devel­op­ment is very rarely a wasted venture if done correctly, and you stand to gain a highly effec­tive and produc­tive workforce.

It’s a win-win.

So if you’re looking to get started on global lead­er­ship devel­op­ment for your company or orga­ni­za­tion, check out our Global Lead­er­ship Devel­op­ment Program here. Together we’ll discuss orga­ni­za­tional devel­op­ment, approaches to imple­ment it and getting to the bottom of chal­lenges your orga­ni­za­tion faces in devel­oping your lead­er­ship on a global scale.

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