Who Gets Your Development Dollars?
Talent Management
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A Good Question, But Not the Right Question.
Depending on your size, your investment in leadership development increased 14%-23% last year. Two thirds of that money was spent on executives (who have already arrived) and less than 8% is spent on leaders who will be in control in the next 10 years. And the worst category of all...the least amount of spend... front line leadership (supervision).
The who question is important, but the answer to the problem is not "who?" but "why?". The why question brings this back to alignment. Leadership development should be aimed at supporting alignment of culture and strategy. Effective gap analysis dictates the "task" - where the money is spent. However, the real reason behind most leadership development is not strategic ... it is retention.
As we exit the recession, talent is again on top of the agenda... however the need is great so we panic and throw money at leadership development -- not to develop leadership but to retain bodies in leadership positions. This is bad spend for a number of reasons... The greatest is the wasted opportunity to make more people successful as the organization succeeds.
A couple of things to think about...
1. Training for the sake of training may be nice but "any training" is never as valuable as "purposeful education" - developing specific knowledge and skills related to the strategic leadership needs of the organization.
2. Leadership grows over a few years not in a few workshops. Education opportunities are great, but they are just fertilizer for experience...and experience is where real skills are crafted. I bet your most important lessons came early in your career followed by multiple opportunities to practice, test and shape concepts into skills. Learning is lifelong but I have seen many leaders fail because they missed out on basic leadership and supervision lessons early in their career - not because they missed an executive development session.
3. Leadership Development is rarely a "standard package" it should reflect and shape the culture you intend to create - not one purchased from a standard "off the shelf" program. You can't purchase culture. Start by designing the culture you intend and then build your leadership development around the core components and competencies. It's more work - but the ROI is always greater and worth it.
Billy R. Bennett
Billy is CEO of Pyramid ODI an organization development company celebrating 25 years of creating strategies and tactics to align organizations toward success.
www.pyramidodi.com