Excuse the Rant: Leadership Development is a Waste of Time and Money.

I had a very respectable campus leader (let’s call her Maria) candidly share that she was not excited about the opportunity to leave several high-priority tasks to attend an executive team kick-off retreat last month.?

“This is not about you, Joe. I’m just saying that I have never found these types of events impactful to the work. In fact, I generally believe leadership training and leadership development is a total waste of time and money.”

I raise a glass to toast Maria in this month’s post. I will put myself out there and say, I agree with you, doc!

Hear What I Am Not Saying

Seriously… Don’t bother. I am not saying LEADERSHIP is a waste of time. I am saying the development, or more specifically, the way we currently train leaders is a waste of time and money if you draw a tight circle around the return (results) on the investment.

If you prefer to avoid my rant and simply get something practical, skip to the end of this post. I list seven questions you should answer in the affirmative before doing any leadership team development.?

Otherwise, commence rant…

The past decade has been a struggle for me. I have failed to create an overwhelmingly “plug-and-play” leadership guide for all humanity to change the trajectory of campus performance.

I have developed fancy models, checklists, bold statements, processes, principles, fortune cookie sayings, and so much more over the last ten years.?

But, no… I have not created anything I believe has helped executive teams (and their teams) put more points on the board. Much of what I have taught and coached has helped deepen the Lead Measures and the reliability of Systems to put more points on the board, but my focus of this post is on leadership.?

I have taken the position that leadership is skill-based. You either have it or you don’t. If a campus leader applies a set of skills competently and consistently, they will effectively evolve into a leader worth following.?

I also hold the position that leadership is contextual. In other words, successfully navigating situations makes the leader (more confident and competent). However, please note that none of these sticks-in-the-sand have produced better leaders.

The problem is that if I want to teach people to be better leaders as a consultant, coach, and trainer, I must teach it as a linear truth with little tolerance for variation. This would be taught as a best practice or a standard, right?

But, alas, I don’t think leadership is teachable as a best practice or a standard. Leaders are born and then made by circumstances, struggles, pain, and setbacks, seasoned with a healthy dose of mentoring via genuine relationships along the way.?

Oh, and the successful ones must tip their hat to a boatload of luck (GRACE) if they are honest.

In other words, my programs don't yield what they are hyped up to deliver — Leaders.?

Honestly, I observe my colleagues doing similar work yielding no better results.?

Leadership is kind of a skill, but mostly an art form developed over a lifetime of modeling, trial, and error, reflection, and adaptation.

As the boss, you define leadership. Your choice - the good kind or the wrong kind. Over time, this becomes your leadership culture. If you define leadership as a set of behaviors, you then teach your people the importance of those behaviors. However, just because you define leadership as a set of behaviors does not mean that applying those behaviors yields LEADERSHIP.?

You also must define leadership outcomes to follow those behaviors, and you must see that those behaviors yield those outcomes all the time to claim that they reliably give you LEADERSHIP.

You can read the remainder of this post and the 7-point challenge HERE.