8 Principles For Embedding Leadership Development In Your Culture

Training and staff development are never ending tasks that require time, dedication, and investment, but they pay big dividends. Over the last three years I’ve focused more and more on developing others. Not that I’ve stopped developing myself, but developing others has helped me grow tremendously.

Developing and enabling others is the highest leadership calling and one that many don’t make the effort to do. Why? Because they don’t care and prioritize it. By doing so they develop an organization impediment which is all too common in organizations.

Your organization is only as adaptable, resilient and smart as its people. So, to me, the biggest impediment to company growth is people.

G.E., Goldman Sachs, Procter & Gamble, Unilever and many companies that consistently outperform all invest heavily in developing their people. They understand that leaders must grow people, so they’ve embedded leadership development into their culture.

With that said, how do you start turning people into leaders on a day to day basis?

You gotta give people a solid foundation of principles and wings (autonomy). Here are 8 to help you get you started:

  1. Invest time and money. No doubt about it, you have to invest your own time in developing others.
  2. Pick out promising people early. Leaders should always be on the lookout for leadership potential. Those that aren’t are neglecting their company of opportunities for growth.
  3. Assign career-building jobs to help round out potential leaders and fill their experience gaps. Basically, harder challenges are most helpful in developing leaders.
  4. Develop leaders within their current jobs. Add short-term work assignments outside of a person’s area of expertise to fill gaps in experience.
  5. Give candid feedback and support. People can’t learn unless they know what they’re doing wrong and right.
  6. Develop teams first. Leaders don’t work alone; they work in a team. Develop the team first, and then figure out the skill gaps within the team and focus on the individual afterwards.
  7. Lead by inspiration rather than brute force. Inspiration is an equalizer when well used. Leading by brute force alone (firing and demoting people left and right) is counterproductive in the long run. It’s better to win your team’s respect by giving them a sense of mission.
  8. Embed leadership development in your culture. Turning people into leaders should be part of the way the organization lives day to day.

Take these principles to heart because superb leadership is rare, and your organization will be miles ahead of your competitors when you nurture it on a consistent basis. Lastly, if you need to communicate with your team in a more efficient manner, then you need a thoughtful framework for the meeting to help you focus on the problems and conversations that need tackling, visit sites like https://www.rock.so/blog/meeting-agenda-examples to learn more.


Bottom line: Your company will grow as your people grow.


Also published on Medium.