3 Strategies That Can Unlock Leadership Potential In Your Employees

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3 Strategies That Can Unlock Leadership Potential In Your Employees

In today’s rapidly evolving business landscape, the pressure on leaders to perform and innovate is more intense than ever. Traditional leadership training methods, which often rely heavily on theoretical knowledge, are increasingly being replaced by approaches that emphasize real-world application.

Experiential learning and targeted coaching are two approaches that have gained substantial traction. Together, they accelerate leadership development and ensure that profound and long-lasting lessons are learned.

The Case for Experiential Learning

As the name suggests, experiential learning involves gaining valuable takeaways through direct experience. Unlike conventional classroom training, which is often passive, experiential learning immerses participants in real-world challenges that reflect the complexities of their roles.

This type of learning is particularly effective in leadership development because it pushes leaders to apply their knowledge and skills in situations that require quick thinking, adaptability, and resilience.

Take, for example, a scenario in which emerging leaders are tasked with managing a cross-functional team on a mission-critical project. This experience tests their ability to lead under pressure and exposes them to the intricacies of team dynamics, stakeholder management, and strategic decision-making. It is more intense and real than learning through lectures and case studies.

Working on stretch assignments, out-of-expertise projects, or in a different function will invariably bolster leadership acumen. The challenges of dealing with a new team, a new culture, a new country or a previously uncharted customer segment or technology can do the same. Getting an emerging leader out of their comfort zone is a way to test their mettle. The best of them will relish the challenge, honing their learning agility and feeding their growth mindset.

There is substantial academic research to support this. Kolb’s Experiential Learning Theory, for instance, posits that learning is a cyclical process involving experiencing, reflecting, conceptualizing, and experimenting. These four elements are crucial for developing critical leadership competencies such as cultural intelligence and problem-solving. And while Kolb’s theory may not fully account for the rich social and cultural dimensions of learning experiences, research shows that experiential learning is especially effective in developing self-awareness, adaptability, and communication skills—key traits of successful leaders.

Research from Deloitte emphasizes the impact of experiential learning on leadership development. According to their findings, experiential learning significantly enhances the application of knowledge to real-world situations. Leaders who participate in experiential learning programs are 88% more likely to apply what they learn to their daily roles compared to those who do not engage in such programs.

Practical Takeaway: HR and Talent Development leaders can play a valuable role by curating key experiences that align with the specific challenges their leaders are likely to face. This curation might include leading high-stakes projects, managing cross-cultural teams, or navigating significant organizational change. The goal is to expose leaders to situations that will stretch their capabilities and create fertile ground for reflection and growth.

The Critical Role of Coaching

While experiential learning is invaluable in its own right, its impact can be significantly increased when coupled with coaching. Coaching provides the structure and support that leaders need to reflect on their experiences, analyze outcomes, and apply their learning in meaningful ways. Without this reinforcement, the lessons from experiential learning can often fade, eroding the effectiveness of the development program.

The experience of a colleague of mine underscores this point. A group of senior leaders participated in a high-octane leadership experience in Italy, traveling to a Formula 1 racetrack in Milan to learn about focus, discipline, and decision-making from professional drivers. What was lacking, however, was follow-up coaching to connect these lessons to their everyday leadership challenges. Thus, some came to view the experience as simply a fun and exciting event rather than the transformative learning opportunity it should have been.

This is where coaching is indispensable. Research indicates that coaching significantly impacts personal leadership development. It helps foster authentic leadership behaviors such as self-awareness, self-discipline and self-confidence, as well as emotional competencies and clarity of objectives and purpose. The research also highlighted the positive impact of leaders’ behavioral changes on followers, who often exhibit higher levels empowerment, job performance, job satisfaction and organizational commitment—an important boost to retention.

I often remind CEOs and talent managers that arranging for emerging leaders to spend a few days at a NASA space camp or crawling through the mud and scaling fences with military cadets is wonderful. But it’s only the start. These high-potential leaders won’t automatically be imbued with the mindsets of an astronaut or Marine. It is coaching support that allows them to connect the dots, helping them reflect on the amazing experience, analyze, and learn from key takeaways. Most significantly, the follow-up enables them to apply the learning to their most important challenges at work.

Practical Takeaway: Learning and development leaders within organizations should integrate coaching into experiential learning programs to extend their shelf-life. Experiential activities should be swiftly followed by coaching sessions. These will help leaders reflect on what they learned, understand how to integrate the lessons into their roles, and identify behavioral changes that should be reinforced over time.

Designing a Balanced Leadership Development Program

To build a robust pipeline of future leaders, organizations must design leadership development programs that balance experiential learning with ongoing coaching. This combination ensures that leaders are not only exposed to new challenges but are also given the tools and support to internalize and apply their learning effectively.

For instance, when a multinational corporation for which I had been consulting decided to acquire a smaller tech startup to expand its digital capabilities, it appointed a new integration leader to oversee the process. The company’s talent development leaders recognized that the executive leading the integration needed specific skills to ensure the merger’s success. Some of the key opportunities for personal growth that were identified included the leader’s strategic thinking and visioning capabilities. He needed to envision how the combined entities could leverage their strengths to innovate and capture new market opportunities.

Another area for development was the leader’s cultural sensitivity and adaptability to better understand and bridge the cultural differences between the corporation with its traditional values and hierarchical structure and the agile startup. Through experimentation in real contexts, followed by targeted coaching conversations, the leader felt empowered and better equipped to foster an environment where the teams on both sides felt valued and motivated.

Effective communication was also a development opportunity, essential to aligning the diverse stakeholders, convey the strategic vision, and ensure transparency throughout the integration process. Several coaching sessions were structured around the various forums and contexts in which the leader would need to show up with clarity and emotional intelligence. His ability to manage the emotional dynamics of the merger, including employee anxieties and resistance, was vital for maintaining morale and engagement.

To support the leader in developing these skills, the company invested in exposing him to novel and challenging situations as part of an experiential leadership development program, including executive coaching. This approach enabled the integration leader to become more comfortable navigating complex and emotionally charged scenarios, build cross-functional relationships, and drive the integration to a successful conclusion, ultimately realizing the full value of the acquisition.

Practical Takeaway: All relevant stakeholders—from top management to leaders in HR and learning and development—should be tapped for input to collaborate on creating customized leadership development programs that combine experiential learning with continuous coaching and micro-learning. Ensure that each element of the program is designed to reinforce the others, creating a cohesive development experience that leads to real, measurable improvement in leadership capabilities and important outcomes for the organization.

Bottom Line

Leadership development is not a one-size-fits-all endeavor. It requires a thoughtful combination of immersive experiences and personalized coaching to truly unlock the potential of future leaders. By focusing on experiential learning and reinforcing it through targeted coaching, HR and Talent Development leaders can create a powerful developmental journey that prepares leaders to navigate the real-life complexities of today’s business world with confidence and skill.

The investment in these strategies will pay dividends as your leaders rise to meet the challenges of tomorrow. As you design or refine your leadership development programs, consider how you can integrate experiential learning with ongoing coaching to create a dynamic, impactful growth experience for your future leaders.

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