As AI enters the scene, the HR and leadership development atmosphere is changing. There’s only one question in the minds of people who are entrusted with developing the next generation of leaders – how should we prepare? In this podcast conversation, Ashish joins Kelli Dragovich, a 4x CHRO, to talk about:
Kelli’s professional journey, narrowing down on how did her early career experiences in HR shape her approach to leadership and management?
How have leadership development programs changed over the past 20 years, and what are the most effective strategies for developing leaders today?
How can HR leaders demonstrate the return on investment (ROI) of their initiatives, and what should they prioritize in the coming years?
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Meet the Speaker!
Kelli Dragovich is a 4x CHRO, coach and advisor who carries valuable professional experience and insights to shape up impactful HR practices. Over her extensive career with major companies, Kelli has played instrumental role in shaping up the HR function.
Saying yes to diverse opportunities early in one’s career is beneficial for learning and visibility. It allows one to discover strengths and interests and to be seen as a go-to person, Kelli shares form her personal experience.
Effective management is about bringing the team along, not just individual execution. First-time managers often make the mistake of managing others the way they manage themselves. Instead, managers should focus on connecting with each team member individually and helping them grow.
Traditional classroom-style leadership development programs have limitations, and modern programs should offer a menu of learning options to accommodate diverse learning styles. Programs should be built with the participants in mind as if they are the customers, and their input should be considered.
Leadership development should be tied to specific business goals and needs of the organization. HR leaders need to define what leadership development means for their organization and what specific changes will be made to leaders.
When it comes to developing future leaders, older leaders teaching leaders is a valuable approach to leadership development, especially when resources are limited. This approach can foster engagement and facilitate scaling.
What’s in the future of HR as per Kelli?
AI can be a useful tool to scale learning programs in HR, particularly in areas such as coaching simulations. AI can assist in making HR more of a facilitator and mastermind role than a hands-on delivery role.
HR leaders should focus on being business partners, demonstrating the ROI of initiatives and linking them to top-line and bottom-line results, especially in conversations relevant to developing future leaders for your organization. This will involve having a point of view on the organization’s goals and what needs to happen to achieve them. In sum, Kelli suggests that HR teams should avoid “filling everyone’s cup” with unnecessary programs.
Meet the Host!
Ashish is an entrepreneur tackling workplace development challenges through Risely, an AI copilot that helps managers and leaders build essential people skills.
Drawing on his experience in technology and organizational behavior, he’s passionate about creating scalable solutions that transform how companies develop their talent. His mission is to empower leaders to build thriving teams and sustainable organizational success.
AI role play training partners for your people managers
Leadership development is not just a one-time thing. It is a constant process of growth and improvement. Traditional training methods often do not fully prepare managers with the practical skills they need for real-life situations.
AI role-play training partners solve this problem. They offer a safe and engaging space for managers to practice tough conversations. They can use leadership ideas and get quick feedback. This hands-on learning leads to a deeper understanding and speeds up the growth of important leadership skills.
In this blog, we will explore how AI role-play training partners can strengthen your leadership development arsenal.
AI role-play training, in simple terms, refers to training that includes engaging in simulations and scenario-based learning with AI avatars. This is quite similar to the scenario-based training and role-plays that are done in conventional leadership coaching practice. It allows managers to engage in realistic cases likely to play out in real life. The AI aspect just multiplies the advantages manifold.
AI role play training partners can:
Do as many re-runs as people managers need without being tired or frustrated
Adopt the tone of a manager’s multiple colleagues
Meet the needs of managers in varied profiles, team sizes, and situations
Practice a range of leadership skills beyond human limits
Be available for training 24*7, truly on-demand learning for managers
Keep aside the bias, personal preferences, and norms that impede vulnerability
Why should AI role play training partners be in your leadership development plans?
That’s a valid question! Why should you use AI role-play training partners when human coaches are right there? The reasons are plenty, too. Leadership coaching, in general, happens to be an inaccessible space for most people managers. Organizational resources for leadership development are concentrated on and around the C-suite, leaving little for the managers who are working on the ground, away from the limelight.
As per research by Gallup, only slightly above 1/3rd managers agreed that they had learning and development opportunities. This becomes important to note, when we know that managers are critical influencers of performance by their team. They are also more likely to face people management challenges from all sides and have higher levels of stress at work. While supporting them is much-needed, it often takes the back seat in conversations. As a result, most of them do not have access to support mechanisms.
So, in the ideal world, every manager gets a coach who is dedicated to their growth. Sounds cool, but impractical.
Plus, we also need to think that the coach should meet frequently enough, have a wide range of experiences to match the client’s needs, and also not impact their professional growth negatively by ensuring safe and secure environment. That’s a BIG ask.
We understand that it becomes a huge bill, but what about the loss? Quantifying the lost productivity of your incredible managers, the missing support to your team members in daily routines, and the physical and mental toss this takes would throw up a high number, too.
AI role-play training partners are the solutions that meet your needs and save your ROI equations from going haywire. Compared to traditional methods that allow role-play training, they cost many times less. Simultaneously, the range of AI role-play training partners is huge. They take up any form you need – from the arrogant guy from Finance to the team member whose rude behavior needs to be addressed. The manager’s learning playground expands by a big number in a few clicks.
For leaders, the trouble does not lie in not knowing the basics. Each of them has ideas about what good time management abilities look like and how to tell their team about it. Where I do get stuck is the conversation with a team member who’s always late or the one who’s overworking themselves and needs to take a break. Role-play training hand-holds through these scenarios to prepare managers and pave the way for their success.
Check out how role-play training with AI works in this quick demo with Merlin, the AI leadership coach:
Do’s and Don’ts for using AI role play training partners
While you are in the process of setting up AI role-play training partners for your people, keep these ideas in mind:
Do’s
Don’ts
Define specific skills to practice, linked to job needs
Don’t miss human interaction opportunities
Master fundamentals first and create comfort with the technology
Don’t race through exercises and ignore reflection time
Base scenarios on actual workplace situations
Don’t dismiss emotional context and forget body language considerations
Provide supporting resources and relevant policies
Don’t use irrelevant examples by skipping customization
Review practice sessions with discussions on learnings and insights
Don’t forget to measure results
How do AI role play training partners work with people managers?
Let’s dive deeper into how AI role play training partners can empower leadership and manager development programs in your organization:
#1 Realistic scenario based training
First up. AI role play training partners fulfil need of realistic scenario based training for people facing roles. While a lot of training for managers is conducted, most of it is focused on generic issues, or if cases are taken up, they may or may not be relevant to each manager’s daily troubles. The lack of direct applicability makes learning harder for people managers, since they do not have ready examples of how to do things in real life.
For instance, if you struggle with setting deadlines with your team, a mentor suggests being more assertive in communication. Sure! That makes sense and will help. But what does assertion really look like? What should your sentences and tone of voice look like? Are you sure you don’t come off as aggressive in this process? A role play for this exact scenario will help you figure things out.
AI role-play training partners bridge this gap. They create the space where your people managers can practice how things really happen without worrying about what their seniors would think if they were seen raising those doubts. It lets them practice as much as they need, thus cutting out the need to pull multiple issues into a one-hour frame of a coaching session. Since it’s an AI, it can also adopt different tones and behave like multiple people on the team to prepare managers who are in a variety of scenes.
#2 Scale infinitely to reach all your people managers
As we noted above, one of the most common challenges in learning and development is the lack of resources. As a result, people managers have to wait for their turn at training and coaching. AI role-play training will help you cut the chase because you can scale on a few clicks. It means managers who have historically been out of the learning and development loop now have a chance to access support 24*7. This adds a massive boost to the employee support programs in your workplaces and goes a long way in establishing a positive brand for you.
Moreover, a lot of industries, such as healthcare and retail, have people managers working on the ground at distributed locations. They can scarcely find the time to gather for shared leadership development activities. These situations are also more emotionally charged than in your average workplace due to the sensitive nature of the work and the higher interactions with people every day. AI role-play training partners fit in perfectly into their busy days because they allow managers to practice a conversation before heading into the meeting room.
Learn how people managers are enjoying AI powered, on-demand coaching support with Risely across industries:
Feedback might just be the most important and most overlooked part of training. Role-play training is helpful not just because you get to act out real-life scenarios but also because then you can collect feedback on how well you did. At times, this is not feasible. It could be due to a shortage of time, given that coaches have to work with multiple people. Or else, if you are doing role-play training with your team members, they may have adequate insights to properly evaluate your performance and offer the right suggestions.
AI role play training partners are great in this regard because they not only offer the freedom to repeat conversations as much as one needs, they follow up with detailed feedback too. For instance, every role play that a manager does with Merlin is followed by a discussion on how they performed. It includes appreciating the strengths and highlighting the areas of improvement. The manager can further ask more questions about specific bits of the conversation to understand how they can improve.
#4 A safe training environment for managers
The challenge with a lot of training – role plays and specific scenarios in particular – is that they need a safe space in order to be successful. Can your workplace guarantee that? As per research by the American Psychological Association, about 15% of workers admit that their workplaces are “toxic” and have lower levels of psychological safety. While the ratio sounds small, it points to more than 1 out of every 10 workplaces.
This points to an absence of healthy co-worker relationships, potential cases of bullying and discrimination, and an overall unhealthy culture. In such scenarios, coaching and mentoring relationships are not viable since there are threats and potential for harm. The people, thus, won’t be open and vulnerable to receive coaching, and the providers could potentially be damaging the situation.
AI role play training partners provide a safe and secure environment where your people managers can practice and learn the tricks of their trade without worrying about sabotage. The mental load created by possible interruptions to their professional journeys is huge and complicates the situation. An AI role play training partner is free from those biases and situational constraints. That’s why the managers can be their true selves and share problems that they would rather not be seen accepting.
Now, let’s break this down even further. When we are speaking of AI role-play training partners, is role play training the end game? Or, is there more to uncover with AI led training for people managers?
How to use AI role play training partners for leadership development?
Merlin, Risely’s built-in AI coach for people managers, is available round the clock to support your people on their everyday quests. It could range from practicing a difficult conversation before hitting the meeting room to thinking long-term and working toward professional goals strategically.
We will understand this in more detail below, but before that, remember: you can start talking to Merlin for free, right now, right here.
#1 Role plays
The first way to engage with Merlin is an AI role-play training partner for people managers. Merlin is capable of taking the form of your team members and carrying out conversations in a few simple steps:
Describe your situation and set the context for the role play. This is where the magic happens, because you have an unparalleled degree of control in designing the conversation.
Run the role play. Talk with Merlin as yourself while Merlin responds as your AI role-play partner.
Gather feedback on how the conversation went, what was right, and what else you can improve.
At times, you know where you need to work; the trouble lies in figuring out how to do that work. Or else, after running a role play, Merlin will point you toward the specific people management areas that you need to improve. In such cases, you can talk about skill development with Merlin. It is further aided by in-built skill assessments for core leadership areas that every leader needs to master. Based on your inputs and assessments, the journey begins on a route just as unique as yours.
#3 Discuss Situations
No journey is complete without its own share of roadblocks. We get it. Whenever a people manager gets stuck, they can simply share the situation with Merlin. At times, even putting forth the challenge and talking about it is super helpful. An AI coach like Merlin is always there to help you in this manner. Based on such discussions, you can proceed with role plays if needed.
#4 Achieve Professional Goals
Last but not the least, developing the careers of people leaders need long-term thought. One of the best ways to sell your L&D initiatives to employees is tying them to the goals that matter to their career. That’s where Merlin becomes your buddy and your manager’s co-pliot. People managers can discuss, set up and plan goals with Merlin. It will help them throughout the planned journey with personalized recommendations and nudges.
If the journey gets tough, Merlin is just a text away.
In these manners, you can expand access to leadership development and other strategic L&D initiatives to a larger audience. AI role play training partners are very helpful in people facing roles since the conventional training modes are harder to access and supply in organizations. In the age where work happens beyond just work desks, learning needs to be on the move too.
To sum up
AI role play training is a great way to build leadership skills. It mixes theory with practice and helps improve decision-making skills. It also gives real-time feedback. This training helps people managers to do well in different management situations.
AI role play is easy to scale and access. This is helpful for remote teams, making sure they keep improving their skills. Adding AI role play to learning programs can really help your managers grow as leaders.
Welcome the future of leadership training. Use AI role play training for your people managers with Merlin!
Deeksha, with a solid educational background in human resources, bridges the gap between your goals and you with valuable insights and strategies within leadership development. Her unique perspectives, powered by voracious reading, lead to thoughtful pieces that tie conventional know-how and innovative approaches together to enable success for management professionals.
Explore AI role play training with Merlin – for free.
Check out AI role plays for people managers, goal-setting, and much more in this trial to unlock unseen benefits for your team.
Healthcare systems are critical to any society. How are we training the people who run them? Learn how leadership development is evolving in the healthcare space with the introduction of AI.
When it comes to the healthcare sector, we often interact with the front end. At the back, another parallel system keeps the show running—the administrative function. They are hidden, yet their presence can be felt in every small or big action, from disoriented teams to misplaced documents. In this healthcare administrative setup, the leaders and managers are like the backbone. They are crucial in ensuring that the show not just runs but does so effectively to support millions of people every day.
The sad part of this story is that it’s not an easy job at all. When it comes to being a manager in the healthcare sector, we are not just asking for solid leadership abilities; there’s a higher need for empathy and caution. It’s not only fast-paced and dynamic but also emotionally taxing. As a result, we witness high burnout among managers in the healthcare sector.
There’s no single cause for this challenge. Healthcare leaders are constantly facing the heat due to:
long work hours that hurt the work-life balance
staff shortages causing overworking
emotional investment in work
high-pressure work environment
While talking of managers here, it’s not uncommon for employees in this sector to handle empathy fatigue while continuing to strain themselves. This went overboard during the COVID-19 pandemic when demands from the healthcare sector hit the sky on quick notice. Since returning from that wave, the sector has coped with distress.
Inherent support systems at work can be one of the most effective solutions for increasing access to support for healthcare workers. This puts managers and leaders at the frontline as coaches and mentors for their teams. Yet, even this is mired with problems due to a lack of investment in healthcare leadership development.
So, what’s the way out? Let’s begin by appropriately contextualizing the role of leadership development in healthcare.
Why is Leadership Important in Healthcare?
Developing leaders in the healthcare space is vital for success because it directly improves employee experiences. Great leaders provide the valuable support, coaching, and motivation that healthcare workers need to sustain themselves in a physically and emotionally straining environment. They are also the key to creating a talent pipeline for succession and effectively building career paths.
To sum up, healthcare leadership development helps you:
Enhance customer experiences: Leadership development programs in healthcare are focused on developing skills that enable seamless experiences for service seekers. This ensures that your employees are focused and dedicated to the task, thus leading to better performance even in high-stress scenarios that are common for healthcare workers.
Enhance people’s experiences: Customers are one side of the equation; your employees are the other. As we noted earlier, too, well-trained leaders better support their teams and carry them forward through challenges. It is also a motivational factor for the employees to see that their growth matters to the organization and aligns with wider business plans.
Manage your people better: Focusing on developing the leaders in your healthcare organization ensures that you have a ready pipeline of talent who can take up bigger roles in the future as the current generation moves on. Leadership development can also help you solve high turnover and absenteeism because it helps employees find the right skills, purpose, and plans for their careers.
What’s the Status Quo of Healthcare Leadership Development?
Let’s break this down with an example.
HealthRight 360, one of the major healthcare providers for vulnerable people, emphasizes the role of leaders in its mission. As an organization committed to making a difference in the lives of people without access to insurance, it is at the frontiers with numerous service providers working every day. It calls for leaders who can unite teams around the mission and translate its core values of empathy.
As part of the healthcare industry with an extensive volunteer network, HealthRight 360 faces some of the most common challenges prevalent in both of these areas, namely, a shortage of resources, people, and time. Thus, prioritization and making the right choices to positively impact people become super important.
What Challenges Do Leadership Development Programs in Healthcare Face?
Healthcare leadership development programs face myriad challenges due to the sheer number of complexities built into the environment itself. First, there is the resource crunch that we discussed earlier. It is not just about funds but also about the availability of people and bandwidth.
As a result, we witness these challenges in healthcare leadership development programs:
Lack of resources to run programs for leaders
Healthcare leaders do not have the hours to invest in leadership development training programs that could take them out of work. In fact, one of the biggest challenges for L&D teams in healthcare is ensuring that people grow while not missing out on work. As a result, even the smaller and shorter alternatives suggested to leaders, like eLearning, are hard to implement, let alone extensive methods like one-on-one coaching.
At times, seeking investment for leadership development and making this case in front of the stakeholders makes things difficult since it is not viewed as an area that can directly bring in revenue. For nascent L&D teams, getting the ROI numbers is a challenge.
Meeting niche expertise needs
A healthcare leader operates in a specific context that happens to be pretty niche. It involves a high level of clinical expertise and a similarly high level of people expertise. The learning and development methods for healthcare leaders need to equip them with a holistic understanding of this environment. Sadly, a majority of leadership development programs available out there are cookie-cutter and do not provide the exact value needed here.
Creating a pipeline for succession
Healthcare institutions often lack the structured infrastructure for preparing leaders for senior roles. Without the strategic approach to identifying and nurturing future leaders, healthcare organizations end up with leadership gaps and succession risks. It is also vital to consider that talent with niche healthcare leadership competencies leaving the organization is a major loss.
Matching competency levels in functional and people skills
Healthcare leadership requires a complex mix of skills. While functional knowledge is critical to success, leaders also need to demonstrate emotional competence and great people skills. In the absence of adequate leadership development programs, leaders are left to grapple with people management challenges without the right toolkit. This poses constant challenges since healthcare employees are prone to burnout and need consistent support.
So, what’s the way out?
Picturing the Ideal Healthcare Leadership Development Program
Healthcare leadership development programs are thus stuck in an impasse because moving further in any direction can break the delicate balance of their environment. As a result, most L&D managers in healthcare remain on the lookout for leadership development solutions to reach out to distributed teams. Their major objective is to tie people around shared values, systems, and leadership approaches even when they are spread across different teams and offices.
To create this ideal solution for healthcare leadership development, we need to think along three pillars:
#1 Meet healthcare managers where they are, literally and metaphorically
There are layers to this challenge.
First, leadership development needs to meet the managers where they work. Healthcare managers often double up as field staff, so they cannot spare days to invest in leadership training. They also do not have the same range of allowances that permit corporate employees to take up the usual leadership development programs. Thus, learning needs to be where they are.
Second, leadership development for healthcare managers needs to align with their skill levels. This is frequently overlooked in the sector, and there’s a gap that any training program would have to bridge. It begins by emphasizing the people management aspect of the job and then further supporting them on the challenges as they show up. Implementing high-level training programs with bullet points on how to do things is not going to prove useful.
Thus, leadership development programs for healthcare managers need to embed themselves in the sector’s flow of work and people management routines.
#2 Define a consistent leadership style for the organization and spread it evenly
Corporates have their vision and mission documents. The culture teams further populate this area with documents describing the values at the core of their mission, leadership styles, and so on. These are often very low on the list of priorities in the healthcare sector. One of the challenges for healthcare L&D is then defining this common leadership culture and propagating it across the organization. We must also consider that not all teams work in a shared space with the same bandwidth.
With this in mind, we need a leadership development method that balances a central focus on organizational philosophy with individualized attention to professional challenges. Directives and documents for coaches seem like the most obvious route to achieve this. However, the questions of diverse interpretations, multiple coaching styles, and lack of constant support soon rise.
#3 Reach out to more healthcare leaders and support them effectively
The third pillar where leadership development programs in the healthcare industry need support is the coverage they offer. Thus far, even traditional corporates have been limited in terms of how many leaders they can effectively train and support. For the healthcare sector, the challenges are made more complex by low prioritization of development initiatives and resource crunch.
Leadership development programs for healthcare thus need to take a turn toward accessibility and scalability, wherein more people managers can seek help easily without hesitation or losing out on precious work hours. Moreover, scalability will allow L&D teams to show ROI much more easily. It happens as outreach to more employees translates into a bigger impact at the organizational level compared to investing in the development of a select few.
Since we have these actions in mind, we should also consider latching to the latest technological developments and using them to reach our goals. AI is one such factor that has shown many use cases in healthcare leadership development.
Let’s explore a few of them in the next section.
How is AI altering Healthcare Leadership Development Programs?
AI for leadership development is one of the hottest areas discussed globally by the L&D industry. Does it have some applications in improving healthcare leadership development programs?
Use microlearning to push growth every day
We have noted that one of the most common challenges for healthcare leaders is that they cannot devote the time needed for leadership development programs. Getting away from work for a few hours every week adds more strain to an already overwhelming schedule, as do programs that span multiple days. Microlearning is the savior here.
Microlearning is not just about reading a bit of information about people management here and there. Ai is putting an interesting twist on this to make it more impactful. At Risely, it unfolds in twin moves:
Nudges: First up, managers on Risely get daily nudges focused on improving their people skills. It focuses on the skills they need (which are assessed first thing), the team members this manager is working with, and the context in which they work. So, a healthcare leader struggling to be assertive at their new job with a team member named Alex will receive an actionable tip to do precisely that, not just anything from a random box of tips & tricks.
Activities: Leadership is not just about learning things; it’s more about doing them in real life. Risely takes this message to the core, which is why most daily lessons are equipped with short activities like watching a video lesson, taking a quiz, or practicing a role-play. These are again personalized to the leader’s context—their skill levels, challenges, job context, and so on.
The fun part? All of this takes about 15 minutes a day at best.
Use AI coaching to meet contextual needs
Another challenging aspect that we noted earlier is the lack of contextual support. Being a leader in a healthcare setting puts one in a unique spot. The job demands are physically and emotionally straining. Few people, either seniors or coaches, are available to support one in these roles since the experience being demanded becomes very niche.
Scaling healthcare leadership development via coaching thus proves to be expensive and time-consuming for the L&D team itself. (At the moment, we are not even going into aligning the coaches with company values and building relationships with the learners, which would be more complex issues for L&D teams that get into this.)
So, who can solve this? An AI coach like Merlin understands every manager’s unique context and offers support solely based on what’s needed. The great thing about AI leadership coaches is that they are always available, even when the work hours are over, and the manager is sitting alone, pondering how to confront someone. That’s where an AI coach shows up and saves the day!
With Merlin, people leaders can access multiple ways of learning. They can simply talk about situations and seek advice. But there are more interesting ways to engage an AI co-pilot in your leadership journey:
Role-play a situation: Is there something weighing heavy on your heart? It’s probably a difficult conversation that you need to have soon but are not sure how to approach it. Role-plays with Merlin help you practice these (as often as you want) by setting up the scenario and defining your partner’s expected behaviors.
Develop specific skills and set goals: You can chat with Merlin about everything related to skill development, from diagnosing what’s missing from your arsenal to creating strategies and roadmaps for growth.
Turn it into a culture agent: An AI coach must be generic, right? Except that it’s not. Setting up Merlin involves researching your company policies and values to ensure that they are reflected in the coaching conversations. While asking for guidance, team members can quickly glance at what the official documentation says, which is great because we both know that they will never open the PDFs otherwise.
Want to see how it works? Catch Merlin in action here:
Focus on scalable solutions for healthcare leaders
Last but not least, we need to reach out to many more healthcare leaders and deliver support. As an L&D team, our mission is to support organizational growth as well as personal goals, but a resource crunch can get in the way. As we noted in the point above, AI can solve this.
Picture this: Your team gets an AI coach supporting managers even while you are asleep. Not just one manager, but as many as you have. You no longer need to worry about scheduling meetings with the right coaches, the costs of accessing them, and regularly hiring for new ones since the previous set leaves. That’s precisely what Merlin does.
That’s not the end of the story. Risely offers people management skill assessments that you can run for the entire team with one click, as opposed to designing them from scratch, getting them printed and distributed, putting reminders to get them filled and returned, and then evaluating them. Leave the whole cycle aside in favor of people skill assessments that you can run as the administrator, with both self- and team ratings and evaluations at the sub-skill levels.
Did we tell you it ties into a learning journey personalized to the manager and offers them bite-sized lessons daily? It does! Give it a spin here; it’s free: Risely’s Leadership Skill Assessments.
There’s no doubt that AI is reinventing healthcare leadership development programs. The question is, are you and your team in the loop? Or, are you missing out by holding conventional methods dear?
Looking Forward
To sum things up, we have the most common challenges of healthcare leadership development programs:
Lack of resources to run programs and multiple stakeholders who are hard to convince
Need for niche expertise that understands both functional and people aspects of the job
Tying into the broader strategic HR goals like succession planning and career pathing
Creating a better understanding of the healthcare leader’s role and where they need support
Developing low-cost, scalable solutions that balance organizational objectives with personal needs
While the traditional methods of leadership development cover some or all of the bases, there’s a large gap to be filled. This is a more challenging case to tackle than corporate leadership development because it demands niche talent to run the initiatives amid a more straining environment.
The latest tech solutions based on AI, like Risely, are enabling new approaches to solve these long-held challenges. Innovative ways to personalize and scale leadership development solutions for healthcare leaders are on the way to make a difference.
Deeksha, with a solid educational background in human resources, bridges the gap between your goals and you with valuable insights and strategies within leadership development. Her unique perspectives, powered by voracious reading, lead to thoughtful pieces that tie conventional know-how and innovative approaches together to enable success for management professionals.
Join the Risely tribe. It’s free!
Sign up today and explore the range of leadership development solutions that fit you like a tailored suit.
How to Make Non-profit Leadership Development Work?
Learn how non-profit leadership development programs play an important role in organizational success, with one of the USA’s biggest animal welfare non-profit organizations showing the way of AI adoption.
Non-profit organizations are one of the most vital pillars of the American society. But here’s a sobering fact: they are also some of the most high churn workplaces, with some research suggesting annual rates as high as 24%. Non-profit organizations are often mission-oriented, but people within them frequently have unmet professional aspirations.
For instance, research by NonprofitHR shows:
The top two reasons for voluntary turnover were better opportunities (reported by 57% of the people) and lack of opportunities for career growth (reported by 43% of the people.)
About 48% of the respondents faced challenges with retaining people working in entry-level roles.
The result is evident. The non-profit organizations are losing their share of young workforce as they are unable to offer a roadmap toward growth. Amid the resource scarcity that characterizes non-profits, as well as the highly demanding nature of the work, the workers are left with few choices but to move on.
One critical factor in this gap is the lack of support that people managers offer in such workplaces. Since non-profits are characterized by resource scarcity, there are bigger claims on the time, money, and efforts before professional development programs can scoop up.
In such a scenario, the people managers have a great role to play. A number of roles in non-profit sectors call for frontline work, putting the managers in a position to directly influence, coach and guide their team members. Given the varied nature of non-profit missions, a lot of this happens outside conventional workplaces with desktops and coffees.
At times, it’s not in the hands of managers either. Most managers in non-profit organizations are not trained in vital people management skills like coaching and motivating others, and thus set up for failure (which itself happens due to time and resource scarcity). Since the model of leadership is incomplete in itself, there are further hurdles in the development process.
The Nature of Non-profits Poses Unique Challenges for Leadership Development
Let’s understand this better with an example.
The Best Friends Animal Society is one of the USA’s foremost warriors for pets in shelters. As a sanctuary for homeless animals, it brings together a passionate group of volunteers working on-field for rescue, support, and care. With a workforce of 900+, more than half of whom work remotely while the rest are distributed in care and training operations, Best Friends has a dynamic work environment frequented by emotionally charged moments. This blog post will take up their case to learn more about non-profit leadership development programs.
Since the workforce is distributed and partly remote, centralized development programs for people managers are a huge task. The complexity increases for teams across multiple states or countries, with different departmental objectives, personal goals, and learning needs being the first layers demanding personalization.
Moreover, as many people are working on the ground, there is limited time available to participate in leadership development programs that could last days or take online courses frequently offered as replacements.
This unique set-up poses challenges for managers to find the time they need for growth and development. And then there’s this emotionally charged field of animal welfare where they need to be prepared to handle diverse and sensitive situations effectively. Yet, it’s not always feasible for them to commit the time to do the manager training or even short e-learning courses.
Janis Cooper
Director of Leadership and Staff Development
A lot of non-profit organizations have similar stories, leading to a few common leadership development challenges:
Establishing consistent leadership and management development programs
This becomes a big challenge because uncertainties are the rule, not the exceptions. There are frequent changes and reallocations that the leadership of non-profits is always grappling with, leaving little bandwidth to invest in the professional development of their people. Moreover, as Janis explained, several people are working in the field. It leads them to have uncertain work hours, availability of time, and mental capacity to learn effectively.
The matters are further complex due to the involvement of volunteers. Since not everyone is a full-time employee with specified work hours, learning budgets, and defined trajectories, organizing development programs is much more complicated.
Enabling learning on the go for busy professionals
Suppose you are managing a team of volunteers. You know that you need to have a leadership development program in place for them. But your options are;
A great leadership coach with solid credentials and an hourly charge of $600 who is available for your team every alternate Wednesday.
A recommended leadership development workshop led by people you look up to, which involves three-day residential learning at the charge of $5000 per person.
An online course on a reputed platform that your team may or may not consume passively to tick boxes and get a certificate.
These options are not just hypothetical. Most offerings for non-profit leadership development training are unrealistic and do not align with the job requirements. To take any of these courses, people need to shell out significant fees, take a good deal of time off work, and need a level of mental freedom that our industry does not offer. This creates a big quandary for L&D and HR teams of non-profits who are searching for effective ways to develop people leaders.
Getting leadership development training that matches the context of non-profits
Workplaces in the non-profit sector differ from corporate ones in a major way – a lot more emotional investment is asked for at every level. As a mission-driven team, you are deeply tied to the outcomes you build toward. For the leadership roles, this poses a unique challenge where they need to focus on professional growth for their own sake and balance it with a high amount of passion and empathy toward the cause. That’s why burnout and emotional distress are quite common in non-profit organizations, which call for a higher focus on non-profit leadership development training focused solely on building emotional resilience, healthy ways to be empathetic, and building work-life balance.
Measuring the impact of leadership development for non-profits
Every workplace has a hard time tracking the impact of leadership development programs. The story is the same for non-profit organizations. It is further complicated by two factors:
First, the HR teams must manage multiple stakeholders. Investing in leadership development training for non-profit managers would be feasible only with their approval. Thus, measuring impact is vital in making a solid case and securing the necessities.
Second, there is a usual delay in adopting innovative solutions based on advanced tech. It keeps non-profits under the grasp of older management philosophies and training methods.
As a result, non-profit leadership development programs need to be very clear about tracking the right metrics, setting benchmarks, and effectively showcasing impact.
All of these challenges of developing leaders in non-profits tietie into the broader HR issues, such as planning career progression paths, creating succession pipelines, and better retaining people. Investing in non-profit leadership development impacts all of these since it shows the people that you care.
What are the Leadership Development Goals for Non-profit Organizations?
Similarly, Best Friends Animal Society’s critical area is developing people leaders and managers. They have developed programs to support these professionals at different points in their career journeys, from onboarding to remedial training if needed.
To sum up, their objectives take this shape:
Ensure that the people leaders are supported at all times in their jobs since the nature of work does not align with fixed hours or locations.
Provide access to personalized training, particularly for skills like emotional competence and communication critical to professional success.
Engage the latest tech in leadership development to meet the needs and expectations of the workforce, in order to retain them at the organization.
With these ideas in mind, the team moved ahead with integrating Risely into their existing and planned manager development programs.
How to Create an AI-powered Leadership Development Strategy for Non-profits?
While the team had multiple leadership development programs on their agenda, they added Risely to the mix to increase support coverage and reach more people, which was a critical gap in the strategy.
You can hear it out from Janis, who leads Leadership and Staff Development at Best Friends Animal Society:
Fundamentally, we can see three pillars of Risely contributing to the success of leadership development programs at non-profit organizations like Best Friends Animal Society:
Nudges and activities for daily learning
Microlearning is a lifesaver for busy professionals, which is very common in the non-profit sector as we discussed earlier. It becomes even better when it matches their contextual needs and helps them beat people management challenges by investing as little as 15 minutes a day. Nudges on Risely are personalized at multiple levels:
Your skill development needs: First, it focuses on the skills you need to work on. As a result, the leaders of organizations like non-profits that call for high human skills but offer little time to learn them effectively can leverage this mode of learning and development.
Your team members: You might struggle in delegating tasks to one team member and confronting another. Risely takes care of that too by ensuring that microlearning resources are shared with your specific team members in mind.
Your strengths and areas of improvement: What does having a low score on communication skills really mean? It could be need of improvement in listening, or a lack of clarity, or something else entirely. Risely’s action-oriented nudges meet you at your level of skill growth.
Your job function: It would not make sense to teach a sales manager something only an engineering manager deals with, so why do we do this in people skills. Risely’s nudges are personalized to your job role. Thus, the situations, tips, and advice you receive matches your unique context.
On-demand coaching with the AI Merlin
One-on-one coaching is among the best tools to support developing leaders. But as Janis explained, most employees do not have the time needed to invest in learning that way. Plus, it creates a big organizational overhead. An AI coach like Risely’s Merlin solves for this by ensuring coaching access 24/7, even when the team member is on the road.
For non-profit organizations, people pose a unique challenge. There’s the need to value their time while also supporting their growth. Increasing the access to coaching through AI-powered services like Merlin helps Best Friends meet the growing needs of their people leaders.
For example, suppose a manager is on the way to address a conflict with a network partner. They can practice this conversation with Merlin since it can take up people’s roles as you define them and become your role-play training partner. That’s just one scenario: there are plenty of difficult conversations that people managers need to have and situations that put them in doubt where a coach’s nudge will help.
Since coaching is already on-demand and hyper-personalized, it saves the L&D function some effort of hiring coaches, matching them contextually, and constantly monitoring the flow. Moreover, you are deploying the latest technology for L&D, thus showcasing how much you value your employees.
With Risely’s AI coach Merlin, managers are now going to have a virtual coach at their fingertips basically available anywhere and anytime, even when they are on the road caring for animals.
Janis Cooper
Director of Leadership and Staff Development
In-depth skill assessments for every learner
Assessments and growth go hand-in-hand, as one leads to the roadmap of the other. Yet, conventional skill gap analysis leaves much to be desired. By deploying Risely’s leadership skill assessments for people managers, Best Friends Animal Society is changing things up massively.
Risely’s leadership skill assessments are a great tool for measuring the health of 30+ critical leadership development skills. They also offer analysis at the sub-skill level, thus going deeper into both diagnosis and problem-solving. Company-wide benchmarking helps managers stay motivated and look forward to reaching and creating new standards across the organization.
All three key actions tie into each other. The ease of assessing numerous managers on leadership skills frees up L&D bandwidth big time. It further goes into creating personalized learning journeys for them, which pave the way for coaching with Merlin and daily growth through nudges and activities—thus setting up a positive growth cycle.
Looking Forward
As an animal welfare organization, Best Friends Animal Society highlights the values of transparency, accountability, and trust in everything they do. Risely’s AI coach, Merlin, helps reinforce them in conversations with the team members by becoming a company culture agent. You can program the AI coach to reflect upon company policies and values and even include them as suggestions. So, even if your manager is lost on the way, someone is holding them back and showing them the way toward achieving what matters the most to you.
We are really thrilled that we are equipping our managers not just with the latest technology but with the skills and confidence that they are going to need to lead in our fast-paced and mission driven environment.
Janis Cooper
Director of Leadership and Staff Development
In the coming year, Best Friends Animal Society is exploring ways to add Risely to more of its leadership and staff development programs. The AI-copilot for leadership development has enabled Best Friends to reach out to more people who need support, enhance employee experiences, and ultimately do more of what they love doing—caring for animals.
Non-profit leadership development programs are super important in your success story. The only challenge is that so far they have been designed without your interests at the core. At Risely, we are trying to flip the script.
Sign up today and share your thoughts on what resources would benefit you the most. Connect with our sales team at info@risely.me to explore sustainable pricing options tailored for non-profit leadership development.
Deeksha, with a solid educational background in human resources, bridges the gap between your goals and you with valuable insights and strategies within leadership development. Her unique perspectives, powered by voracious reading, lead to thoughtful pieces that tie conventional know-how and innovative approaches together to enable success for management professionals.
Join the Risely tribe. It’s free!
Sign up and access the world of AI driven leadership development.
$30 does not sound like a huge amount. But it can surely deliver a lot of value when you need it. Today, you might be able to get:
2-3 McDonald’s Big Mac Meals
Two movie tickets
A new paperback book
A month of leadership coaching by Risely
How’s the last one possible? It’s because our Black Friday and Cyber Monday sale is live!
Now, you can grab any Risely package at half the price. Use the coupon code BFCM2024 at the checkout, and you’re all set to shine!*
Let’s see what that looks like – for a price of $30, you get:
AI Coaching with Merlin
Merlin is Risely’s AI coach for people leaders and managers. It allows you to get answers to troubling situations and develop skills at your convenience. You can access support in three
exciting modes: discussions, skill development, and role-plays.
But that’s not all. Merlin also supports a voice mode in over 40 languages, so that help feels like home. The sessions are on-demand and always available, so you never need to worry about people management troubles holding you back.
Your challenges are as unique as you are. Putting you into a box with a hundred others won’t do justice. That’s why every manager on Risely gets a custom leadership development journey.
You start by picking relevant challenges that you are experiencing. Further, you are assessed on the core leadership and management skills before a plan is prepared. With this roadmap, you get daily nudges and activities to complement learning in the flow of work.
“I want to be a good manager.” Sure, but what does being a good manager really mean? What skills are we talking about? What journey are you going to take before you are deemed good?
Risely helps you understand these ideas better with the Skill Center. Risely’s Skill Center equips managers with 30 essential skills with opportunities to self-assess, solicit team feedback anonymously, and get detailed reviews of your abilities.
Risely is the buddy who will hold your hand through the ups and downs of professional life.
What changes can you expect with Risely?
Guidance at every step of the way. Forget being confused and worrying about how you will handle the role of a manager.
Ownership of your professional growth. If you are tired of the usual mix of leadership development programs that preach before they diagnose, you are about to find respite. Risely lets you take charge and set the direction.
All-around progress, especially in your people skills. Most professionals focus on their job’s functional skills and ignore this bit, which is very important for success in managerial roles.
Ashish is an entrepreneur with over 20 years of experience in strategy, coaching and product. In the present avatar, he is building Risely, an AI-enabled leadership development platform in between breaks from treks and baking.
Let’s bring change: one feedback at a time.
We’ve built Candor as a tool to share anonymous feedback from employees with team managers. It’s free. Give it a spin here and start connecting.
It’s 2024, and being a good leader is more important than ever. Good leaders do more than just guide their teams to meet the company’s goals; they also motivate people to give their best. But not everyone starts out as a great leader. The good news is there are plenty of leadership development training courses designed to help you grow into an effective leader.
This blog will take you through seven top-notch courses that aim to boost your leadership skills. These courses tackle various subjects like understanding emotions better, communicating strategically, leading high-performing groups, and thinking outside the box for solutions. They’re perfect for anyone hoping to improve their game in leadership roles—from managers all the way up to CXOs.
So, let’s hop right in!
Top 7 Leadership Development Training Courses You Should Try!
Growing as a leader is an ongoing journey about boosting your ability to lead and building your skills. It means getting to know and polishing your own way of leading and picking up the key skills needed to guide others well. While knowing your stuff technically can help you climb the ladder at work, having soft skills like understanding people’s feelings, working well with others, being adaptable, and solving problems is just as important for truly effective leadership.
Yet, busy schedules take over and throw out learning and growth. Online courses for leadership development are a great way to bridge this gap. Let’s explore some leadership development training courses that can boost your profile and break the rut.
Being a good leader is about understanding and handling feelings well, both yours and those of the people you work with. The emotional intelligence course offered by American Management Association teaches important emotional smarts that every top-notch leader needs.
In this course, you will explore leadership training for emotional intelligence and why it’s key to leading effectively. You will learn how being aware of your emotions, controlling them, understanding others’ feelings, and managing relationships play a big part in emotional intelligence. This can help you connect better with your team members, motivate people around you more effectively, and make choices that lead to success for everyone involved.
Why should you take this course?
Emotional intelligence prepares you to handle difficult people management situations better, such as conflicts, broken professional relationships, or sensitive conversations.
The Leadership Development Program by the Center for Creative Leadership brings home innovative approaches to developing leaders. One of the program’s primary objectives is to reduce the gap between frontline staff and senior management, which is a frequent impediment to organizational effectiveness. By reducing such communication and strategic gaps, you can enhance performance for the whole set-up. That’s not all; this leadership development training course also goes into the following:
Leveraging identities and building resilience in the team as a leader
Using networks to support personal and professional development for yourself and your peers at work
Developing the skills you need to understand the role of DEI and build relevant skills effectively
Leadership Development Training Course #3
Leadership Training for Results: Unleash Talent in Others
To lead teams that perform well, you need to know some special tricks and methods. This course by Dale Carnegie Institute empowers you to enable performance in others. It teaches people leaders what they need to know so their teams can do their best work.
In this course, you will first understand how to be confident in your leadership abilities. Next up, the course adopts an other-focused approach, so learn all about enabling and empowering others as a team manager or leader. You will better understand the typical problems that trouble teams, how to diagnose them, how to manage common types of teams, and the ins and outs of building a strong team on the foundation of effective communication.
What You Will Learn About Team Building and Management?
You will learn about being and building accountability in your team. The key questions being answered are: What is accountability, and how can you develop it in yourself and others?
You will understand the common reasons why teams get in trouble. After learning about the causes and contexts, you will move on to resolving these challenges with your team through strategic interventions with an external focus.
This leadership development training course combines many interesting elements in a concentrated yet comprehensive three-day program focusing on your growth and development. It starts with assessments and then provides support through convenient one-on-one coaching. That’s not all, though; the program enables support through peer-to-peer learning and post-program support in the form of leadership coaching for 90 days. Compared to the previous course, we saw focusing externally; this makes you focus on yourself. The journey is one of “self-discovery,” as described on the program’s website.
This course teaches you the many faces of leadership, how to switch up your style based on what’s happening around you, and how to make plans for personal growth. You will discover what makes you strong as a leader and where you can improve.
If you were to ask one thing that marks the present era of business, the answer is likely to be simple: change. The rapid global movement needs leaders who are both ready and proactive in handling such situations. You have a big job: explaining why change is necessary, standing by their team members during the shift, and getting everyone excited about trying new ways of doing things.
How will this course help you in the journey of managing change?
First, the course begins by building the foundations and assessing your change management skills. It helps you understand change management and how it works, including the primary processes and phases within the change management cycle.
Next, this course prepares you to handle the most troublesome aspect of any change, which is resistance. You will also develop a framework to propel and sustain changes in organizations.
Ethics are super important when it comes to being a good leader. Resultantly, it’s one of the most important leadership development training topics. When leaders make choices that are right and fair, they not only get the trust and respect of their team members but also help create a really positive place to work. Being ethical in leadership means sticking to what’s morally right, keeping honest, and making decisions based on what’s ethically sound. Leaders who stick by their ethics set a great example for everyone on their team, encouraging an atmosphere where everyone trusts and treats each other fairly.
In this course you will learn how to:
Develop a framework for understanding the responsibilities leaders have
Determine and deliver on your economic, legal, and ethical responsibilities
Formulate a plan to address conflicts and communicate the “why” behind your decisions
Establish a toolkit for making tough leadership decisions now and in the future
Leadership Development Training Course #7
Critical Thinking & Problem Solving For Organizational Leaders
During the course, you will dive into the concept of creative thinking in problem solving and work around ways to enable it with your team. You will learn ways to make your teams more open to new ideas, encourage everyone to think creatively and tackle any hurdles that might stop innovation.
Key Takeaways from This Course on Fostering Innovation
In this course, you will gather:
An understanding of how creativity, problem-solving, and decision-making work in tandem in real-life scenarios
To weave leadership development programs into the fabric of an organization, you need a well-thought-out plan and a holistic approach. Here’s a simple framework to use leadership development training courses with your team:
Start by figuring out what your team needs in terms of leadership skills and what would be the essential leadership development training topics in your context. Look closely at where you are strong and where you need help. You can seek feedback, take skill assessments from Risely, or conduct a personal SWOT analysis.
Then, put together tailored leadership development training courses that match your organization’s goals and tackle specific areas that need improvement.
Coaching and mentoring give leaders extra support to grow their abilities while guiding them along their development journey. So be open to accepting those offers from potential coaches at work. If not, you can look for coaches outside.
Promoting an environment that values learning encourages everyone in charge to keep getting better through various activities designed for growth. Thus, start discussing your ideas and get going.
Lastly, remember to check regularly to see if these efforts are making a difference for you and the whole group. Adjust as needed based on what you find.
When leaders start acting differently in good ways—like talking better with their teams or solving problems more effectively—it shows the training did its job. By keeping track of improvements in how a team gets along and does its work overall, you can be sure that you are getting real value from investing in leadership development training courses.
Deeksha, with a solid educational background in human resources, bridges the gap between your goals and you with valuable insights and strategies within leadership development. Her unique perspectives, powered by voracious reading, lead to thoughtful pieces that tie conventional know-how and innovative approaches together to enable success for management professionals.
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Leadership is a critical aspect of any organization’s success. The ability to effectively lead and inspire a team is essential for achieving business objectives and driving growth. However, leadership is not an innate skill that everyone possesses. You must continuously develop and refine your team members to make them effective and impactful leaders. That’s where leadership training companies come in. These companies provide comprehensive training and coaching programs that help leaders enhance their skills, improve their leadership effectiveness, and achieve better results.
Several leadership training companies stand out for their expertise and track record in delivering high-quality leadership development programs. These companies deeply understand leadership effectiveness and offer valuable insights and solutions to help business leaders like you achieve their full potential. Here are the top leadership training companies to watch:
Innovative Leadership Institute
Focus areas: Differented learning processes
The Innovative Leadership Institute is a leading provider of professional development programs and coaching services. They offer customized leadership development solutions for leaders at all levels, from emerging leaders to senior executives. Their programs focus on developing essential leadership skills, enhancing communication and collaboration, and fostering a culture of innovation.
What puts them among the top leadership training companies?
The Innovative Leadership Institute recognizes that different leaders have different needs and styles, and they tailor their solutions accordingly, so you will find multiple engaging learning methods on their site to pick from.
Global Leadership Foundation
Focus areas: Emotional intelligence
The Global Leadership Foundation specializes in developing emotional intelligence in leaders. They believe that emotional intelligence is critical to leadership effectiveness and organizational success. Their coaching and training programs help you develop self-awareness, empathy, and practical communication skills. The Global Leadership Foundation provides valuable insights into the role of emotional intelligence in leadership and offers practical strategies for enhancing emotional intelligence in the workplace.
What puts them among the top leadership training companies?
By empowering leaders with emotional intelligence, the Global Leadership Foundation equips you with the tools needed to build strong relationships, inspire your teams, and drive positive change.
Risely
Focus areas: AI-powered personalized coaching
Risely is known for creating leadership development experiences that fit you like a glove, combining AI and human expertise. It brings together insights from a wide range of data and curation to create learning journeys that suit the unique needs of every manager. It helps you break free from the rut of typical leadership training that is made for everyone and every circumstance. Instead, focus on the skills that matter to solve your people management challenges.
What puts them among the top leadership training companies?
Risely offers the value that every manager’s precious journey deserves with hyper-personalized solutions and in-depth progress tracking throughout. It brings learning into the work flow with workspace integrations, an AI coach, and regular nudges.
The Center for Creative Leadership
Focus areas: Innovating leadership
The Center for Creative Leadership is renowned for its research-driven approach to leadership development. They offer a wide range of programs and services designed to help you develop the skills and capabilities needed to drive organizational change and achieve better results. The Center for Creative Leadership’s programs are based on the latest research and best practices in leadership development. They provide leaders with new skills, insights, and strategies to navigate the complexities of today’s business environment.
What puts them among the top leadership training companies?
Whether you are looking to enhance your leadership abilities, lead through organizational change, or develop new skills, the Center for Creative Leadership has a program that can meet your needs.
Focus areas: Building healthy habits
FranklinCovey is a well-known name in the leadership training industry. It is known for its focus on developing effective habits for success. FranklinCovey’s programs help leaders develop the skills and mindset needed to achieve better results and drive success in their organizations. Their approach is based on the principles of leadership effectiveness and personal accountability. By focusing on developing effective habits, FranklinCovey equips you with the tools to lead teams to success.
What puts them among the top leadership training companies?
FranklinCovey’s focus on building effective habits that translate into solid management and leadership practices enables sustainable development for leaders and managers like you.
Blanchard
Focus areas: Leadership team development
Blanchard is known for its expertise in building engaging leadership experiences. They offer a wide range of programs and services that focus on team building, coaching, and meeting the unique needs of organizations. Blanchard’s programs are designed to create engaging and interactive learning experiences that foster leadership development and drive organizational success.
What puts them among the top leadership training companies?
Whether you are looking for team-building activities, coaching services, or customized solutions for your organization’s specific needs, Blanchard has the expertise and resources to help you build a strong and effective leadership culture.
From tailoring solutions for every leadership level to empowering emotional intelligence and bridging theory and practice, these companies offer a range of specialized programs and services that cater to the specific needs of leaders and organizations. Their research-driven approach, focus on habits for success, and expertise in leadership development for the digital age are just a few examples of the unique offerings that make these companies must-see in the leadership training industry.
How can you pick from the top leadership training companies for your team?
Leadership training companies employ various methods to measure the improvement in leadership skills and effectiveness of their clients. These methods provide valuable insights into the impact of the training programs and help you gauge the return on investment in leadership training.
Navigating the Selection Process
Navigating the selection process for leadership training companies can be a daunting task. With so many options available, it’s important to carefully consider your organization’s needs and goals before deciding. Here’s a short introduction to the three steps you must take:
Identify needs: Identifying your organization’s needs is the first step in the selection process. Consider your strategic planning objectives, the specific leadership skills you want to develop, and the challenges your organization is facing. This will help you determine the leadership training program that best meets your needs.
Identify limits: Budget considerations are also important when selecting a leadership training company. Determine your budget for leadership development and consider the value that different programs offer in terms of cost.
Evaluate the alternatives: Finally, research the reputation and track record of potential training companies. Look for success stories, testimonials, and case studies that demonstrate the effectiveness of their programs. Consider the expertise and experience of their coaches, the content and structure of their programs, and the level of support and resources they provide.
How do we measure the impact of leadership training companies?
One common approach is the use of pre and post-assessment tools. These tools assess the leadership skills and competencies of your team members before and after participating in the training programs. By comparing the results, you can track your leader’s progress.
Continuous feedback mechanisms are another method these leadership training companies use to measure leadership improvement. Through regular feedback sessions, you can collect insights from the participants, enabling your team to make necessary adjustments and monitor growth.
Success stories from renowned clients highlight the transformative impact of leadership training programs offered by these companies. These success stories often showcase the development of specific leadership skills, such as executive presence, emotional intelligence, and effective communication. They also highlight the tangible results achieved, such as improved business performance, increased employee engagement, and enhanced organizational culture, which you can use while choosing for your team.
Conclusion
In conclusion, investing in leadership training is crucial for organizational growth and success. The top companies listed provide tailored solutions, emphasize emotional intelligence, bridge theory with practice, and focus on research-driven programs and habits for success. Their unique offerings include customized learning journeys, virtual coaching sessions, peer networks, and proprietary models. By measuring leadership improvement through assessments, feedback mechanisms, and impact studies, these companies have proven success stories with Fortune 500 companies and beyond. Your team can be the next one, start a free trial today.
Deeksha, with a solid educational background in human resources, bridges the gap between your goals and you with valuable insights and strategies within leadership development. Her unique perspectives, powered by voracious reading, lead to thoughtful pieces that tie conventional know-how and innovative approaches together to enable success for management professionals.
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Leadership training activities are an excellent way to enhance leadership skills, promote team building, and improve overall productivity. These activities allow individuals to practice and develop their communication, problem-solving, decision-making, and critical thinking skills in a controlled and supportive environment.
This blog will explore 10 easy-to-do leadership training activities that can be implemented in various professional settings. These activities are designed to engage participants, foster teamwork, and enhance leadership skills. Whether you are a team leader or a new leader looking to develop your leadership abilities, these activities offer valuable personal and professional growth opportunities.
Leadership training activities are an effective way to develop essential leadership skills and qualities. These activities provide opportunities for individuals to practice and enhance their communication, problem-solving, decision-making, and critical thinking skills. Here are 10 engaging leadership training activities that can be easily implemented in various professional settings:
The Blindfold Game
Skill in focus: Verbal communication, Active Listening
The Blindfold Game is a trust-building activity that requires participants to rely on their team members for guidance. It promotes practical communication skills and trust-building among team members.
How do you do the blindfold game of leadership training?
Design an obstacle course with materials available near you in the workspace
Blindfold one of the participants
Assign the task to your team members: They have to navigate with the help of verbal instructions from their team
Discussion round: Talk about good and bad examples of verbal communication you observed
Role Reversal
Skills in Focus: Understanding Different Perspectives
Role Reversal is an activity that allows participants to step into the shoes of others and understand different perspectives. It promotes active listening, empathy, and the ability to see things from different angles.
How do role reversals help in leadership training?
In this activity, participants are divided into pairs, each pair given a scenario or a problem to solve. Each person takes turns assuming the role of the leader while the other person takes on the role of a team member. This activity helps participants develop their leadership qualities, improve their active listening skills, and become more empathetic leaders.
The Shipwreck
Skills in focus: Problem Solving, Critical Thinking
The Shipwreck activity challenges participants to make decisions under pressure. It promotes critical thinking, problem-solving, and decision-making skills.
How is the shipwreck leadership training activity conducted?
In this activity, participants are presented with a hypothetical scenario where they are stranded on a deserted island after a shipwreck. They must work together to prioritize and make decisions about the limited resources available to them.
Feedback Circle
Skills in focus: Constructive Feedback Skills
The Feedback Circle is an activity that focuses on developing constructive feedback skills. It promotes emotional intelligence, effective communication, and the ability to provide feedback in a supportive and constructive manner.
Steps to run a feedback circle leadership training
In this activity, participants sit in a circle and take turns providing feedback to each other based on a specific prompt or question. The Feedback Circle encourages participants to practice giving and receiving feedback, develop their emotional intelligence, and improve their leadership behaviors. This activity is valuable for enhancing leadership skills and fostering a culture of open and constructive communication within a team.
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Skills in focus: Self-awareness
The Leadership Compass activity helps participants identify their leadership styles and develop self-awareness. It promotes team building and the understanding of different leadership traits.
How can you run the leadership compass activity?
In this activity, participants complete a leadership style assessment and discuss the results with their team members. They explore the strengths and weaknesses of different leadership styles and how they can adapt their leadership approach to different situations. The Leadership Compass helps participants develop a deeper understanding of their own leadership traits.
The Minefield
Skills in focus: Communication and Trust
The Minefield activity focuses on improving communication and trust within a team. It promotes effective communication skills, trust-building, and team bonding.
How to conduct the minefield activity?
This activity is similar to the first blindfold game that we saw above. In this activity, participants are divided into pairs, one blindfolded and the other acting as their guide. The blindfolded participant must navigate through a “minefield” (a designated area with objects) with the help of their guide’s verbal instructions. The Minefield activity encourages your team to communicate effectively, trust their team members, and work together to overcome challenges.
Bridge Building
Skills in focus: Collaboration and Problem-Solving
Bridge Building is an activity that focuses on collaboration and problem-solving skills. It promotes teamwork, leadership skills, and effective communication.
How to conduct the bridge-building activity?
Gather some materials of daily use (notepads, pens, cups, etc.) in your workspace
Divide your team into small groups
Assign the task: create a bridge that can support the weight of a specific object or cross a designated gap
The Great Egg Drop
Skills in focus: Creativity and Innovation
The Great Egg Drop is an activity that promotes creativity, innovation, and leadership development. It encourages participants to think outside the box and come up with innovative solutions to protect an egg from breaking when dropped from a height. It also promotes teamwork and a sense of camaraderie among participants.
How do we conduct the egg drop activity for leadership training?
Assign common objects from the workplace to your team members
Share the task: design and build a contraption to protect their egg
Scenario Planning
Skills in focus: Strategic Thinking and Planning
Scenario Planning is an activity that focuses on strategic thinking and planning. It promotes critical thinking, decision-making, and the ability to anticipate and prepare for future challenges.
How do you do the scenario planning activity?
In this activity, participants are presented with different scenarios or challenges and must work together to develop strategic plans to address them. Scenario Planning encourages participants to think strategically, analyze potential outcomes, and make informed decisions.
Leadership Reflections
Skills in focus: Self-awareness and Personal Growth
Leadership Reflections is an activity that focuses on self-awareness and personal growth. It promotes self-reflection, self-improvement, and the development of leadership qualities.
How can you do the leadership reflections activity?
In this activity, participants are given time to reflect on their leadership journey, strengths, weaknesses, and areas for growth. They can engage in journaling, group discussions, or self-assessment exercises on leadership skills to better understand their own leadership qualities. Leadership Reflections activity encourages personal development, fosters self-awareness, and helps new leaders identify areas for improvement and growth.
While the above set consisted of simple and easy to start leadership training activities for your team, those listed below will need you to collect some materials and define the rules pretty clearly before you start:
The Marshmallow Challenge
Skills in focus: Teamwork and Innovation
Materials: Spaghetti sticks, marshmallows
The Marshmallow Challenge is a popular activity that focuses on teamwork and innovation. It encourages participants to work together, think creatively, and develop strategies to build the tallest tower using only spaghetti, tape, string, and marshmallows.
How does the marshmallow challenge work?
Divide participants into teams of 3-5 members each for this activity. Try to mix up people from different departments or with varied skill sets to encourage diverse perspectives. Present the challenge to the teams. They have a limited time (usually around 18 minutes) to build the tallest free-standing structure and can use only the materials provided (spaghetti). The catch is that the marshmallow must be at the top of the structure and supported by the structure itself, not just balanced on top. Discuss how the skills and insights gained from the challenge can be transferred to real-world situations.
Tower of Babel
Skills in focus:Cross-functional Teamwork, Communication
According to the biblical story, people once spoke a single language and decided to build a tower that would reach the heavens to symbolize unity and ambition. God confused their language to thwart their plans, so they could no longer understand each other. As a result, they could not effectively communicate and coordinate their efforts in building the tower. The Tower of Babel effectively simulates the dynamics of a work environment where cross-functional collaboration is key to achieving success, making it an effective leadership training activity for nurturing well-rounded leaders.
How to create the Tower of Babel?
Divide participants into small groups and assign each group a specific role or character from the story (e.g., builders, leaders, God). Ask them to role-play a scenario where they attempt to build the tower, facing the challenges of communication breakdown and cultural differences. Introduce communication challenges similar to those faced in the story. For example, provide instructions in a language unfamiliar to the participants or ask them to complete a task with limited verbal communication.
Read more: 5 Easy & Fun Icebreaker Office Games For Teams
Conclusion
In conclusion, leadership training activities are crucial in developing essential skills for effective leadership. By engaging in interactive and engaging exercises like trust-building blindfold games and decision-making scenarios, teams can enhance communication, problem-solving, and collaboration. Incorporating a variety of leadership training activities, from feedback circles to strategic thinking games, can cater to diverse learning styles and maximize leadership potential. Elevate your leadership skills by embracing these activities in structured training sessions and everyday situations to cultivate a continuous growth and development culture.
Deeksha, with a solid educational background in human resources, bridges the gap between your goals and you with valuable insights and strategies within leadership development. Her unique perspectives, powered by voracious reading, lead to thoughtful pieces that tie conventional know-how and innovative approaches together to enable success for management professionals.
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