Leadership Development and Management Training Programs

Leadership development is the process of helping leaders at all levels of an organization develop both their leadership skills and self-awareness to drive interpersonal agility and better business outcomes.

For most organizations, leadership development and management training may have different meanings. In many cases, we combine both leadership development and management training into the same programs.

For the sake of this article, we’ll use the terms interchangeably. In reality, we can customize all of our content to meet our client’s unique business and industry needs.

With the right program in place, leadership development can help your leaders develop the right skills and self-awareness to be ready for the future of work and drive better business results. When elevated skill sets are combined with increased self-awareness, leaders then possess the agility to navigate an increasingly complex and fast-paced work environment.

With a strong leadership development program in place, your leaders will be better equipped to:

• Craft and communicate a compelling vision.
• Set clear expectations.
• Communicate intentionally to build buy-in.
• Align people around the right objectives and key results.
• Coach and develop team members effectively (behavioral coaching skills).
• Provide performance feedback based on behaviors observed.
• Delegate effectively and operate at the right level.
• Create a motivating environment for team members.
• Recognize others more effectively.

Leadership development and management training can also help leaders enhance their ability to:

• Build self-awareness and understand impact to others and the business.
• Understand how they respond to different personality styles.
• Adapt their communication style to become more multidimensional.
• Modify their approach as they delegate, develop, motivate and communicate up.
• Remain composed when interacting with leaders who have competing priorities.
• Overcome overly aggressive or overly passive tendencies to build more effective relationships and team member commitment.

A one-size-fits-all approach to leadership development and management training doesn’t work. Our thought leadership, experience and perspectives allow us to tailor a program’s design and delivery to the unique developmental needs that leaders have at different levels in an organization.

Front-line and mid-level leaders

The challenge for many front-line and mid-level leaders is making the transition from being technically talented to leading others—as they often get tapped to lead because of their technical prowess but aren’t prepared to lead others. As a result, it’s not uncommon for team members to get frustrated, overwhelmed and disengage. In Sal Silvester’s book Ignite! The 4 Essential Rules for Emerging Leaders, he lays out his four-point People-First Leadership model for the fundamentals of sound leadership.

Senior leaders

Senior leaders often find themselves on multiple teams, leading functions and departments of the business, and even overseeing areas of the business in which they may not have had expertise in the past. They are frequently on multiple teams and have competing priorities with their peers. The challenge for most senior leaders is usually one of shifting mindsets versus skillsets. Sal Silvester outlined four key mindset shifts needed in his book Unite! The 4 Mindset Shifts for Senior Leaders.

Executives

At the executive level, we usually see highly driven and successful people. Their challenge often comes from underestimating their impact or even overcoming derailing tendencies that impact employee alignment, engagement and commitment. For executives, the shift to an enterprise mindset and developing a first-team mentality with their leadership team are often some of their greatest challenges.

At 5.12 Solutions, our research shows that there is a direct correlation between effective leadership and better business outcomes. Based on that research, we employ a few foundational principles that guide our approach to leadership development and management training.

1. We view learning as an ongoing, circular process. It’s not a singular event that happens once and it’s over, where change doesn’t stick. Utilizing our Learning Loop methodology, we employ a unique combination of assessments, training, coaching and consulting, and our proprietary Coachmetrix technology to measure change and ensure sustainability of leadership development.
2. We believe that behavioral change should be measured and that our clients deserve to know their return on investment (ROI). That’s why we invented Coachmetrix as a platform to add more transparency and accountability into leadership development.
3. We believe that busy leaders need content that is relevant and delivered in a time-efficient manner. There is a way to impact leaders without negatively affecting their work output.
4. We believe that leadership development will stick when it is relevant. That’s why we integrate an organization’s unique values and leadership philosophies into the design and delivery process of all our programs.

The duration of our leadership development and management training programs can be tailored depending on a client’s objectives. When the focus is on targeted skills or boot camp-style management training to help leaders create a common language quickly, the program may be delivered in one or more 4–6 hour workshops.

However, when the focus is on developing high-potential leaders, ensuring change is sustained over time or creating cultural shifts, our long-term programs that combine training, coaching and measurement may be the right fit. These high-potential leadership programs are usually 6–12 months in duration, depending on our client’s unique needs.

Our leadership development measurement methodology is one of our core differentiators. Years ago, we noticed gaps in our own management training programs and those of other leadership development firms with whom we worked. So we set out to change the industry, to add more accountability and transparency in the leadership development process with our Coachmetrix technology.

Using Coachmetrix, we can measure whether leaders are making positive behavioral change as a result of our programs. And, in many cases, our leadership development engagement is structured so that we are only paid after we’ve proven that leaders have changed.

With our Coachmetrix technology, we can:

• Ensure there is transparency of action plans.
• Calibrate action plans between a leader, the coach and their manager.
• Measure behavioral change from the standpoint of stakeholders who are impacted by the leader’s behavior.
• Share resources, frameworks and tools online so that they are always accessible to the leader.
• Generate discussions to check in with the leader online between workshops and coaching sessions to add more structure and reinforcement for change.
• Create assignments so that leaders always know what’s expected of them in the leadership development or management training program.

Although we started our leadership development programs in Boulder, Denver and the greater Colorado area, we have now expanded our reach across the United States and internationally. 5.12 Solutions has over 50 leadership development trainers, coaches and consultants on its team and can bring our programs almost anywhere.

If you are interested in exploring how we can support your leadership development and management training efforts, connect with us for a complimentary leadership Insight Session. During this 45–60 minute conversation, we’ll explore your needs at a deeper level and help you determine whether our programs are a fit and how to create action-oriented and confident leaders.