Over the last years, I worked a lot with leaders on different levels to help them to deal with the significant changes in the working environment they are confronted with. True globalisation, virtualisation, digitalization, individualisation of employees and customers alike or acceleration of markets and environments make it more and more challenging for them to fulfil their tasks and expectations from the various stakeholders. So more than ever companies are looking for support to prepare the leaders of today and tomorrow for their jobs. Unfortunately a lot of leadership development programs are often not keeping up with the developments, the speed and the acceleration of change in the business environment.

On linkedIn I wrote an article about some aspects describing my personal perspective on Leadership Development. All of the elements I discussed in my work with individual leaders and leadership teams alike over the last few years. Details on each topic you can find in the article on linkedIn:

  • LD as OD: Understand Leadership Development and Organisational Development as two sides of one medal.
  • Individualization: Individual needs, skill levels and context should be reflected in LD programs, not efficiency and standardisation.
  • Modularization: Flexible modules can help to individualise and increase cost-efficiency at the same time.
  • Hands-on Application: Leading is not visioning and command and control any more. Modern LD needs to reflect pragmatic application of everyday tools, and strong integration of leadership, management and expert knowledge.
  • Business Integration: Wherever possible LD should be integrated into real-life and NOT be delivered as a standalone program.
  • “Learning-Bites”: LD should provide learning & development anytime, anything, anyplace.
  • Digitalization: Modern LD should use technology as an important content element, but also as a delivery technology to provide the LD services.
  • Self-Referential: LD must reflect the desired goals and company culture – not just in the overall design and content, but in every workshop design, question and word in the program to have maximum impact.
  • Gamification: High potential of gamification to increase attractivity and impact of LD activities alike.

A lot of HR responsible I am talking with these days agree on some of the elements but often struggle with the full and integrated implementation of all of them. I fully agree, that this can be challenging and is not always possible already from the beginning. But I would like to encourage all HR responsible to move stronger into that direction, providing maximum value to the business and quickly apply the benefits of digitalization to their areas of responsibility. I believe that AI algorithms, machine learning and digital tools will also revolutionise the HR domain as it will change all other areas of professional and personal life. Humans should be still in the center of the HR activities, but as humans will interact more and more with machines as well as other humans in the near future, also leadership needs to be redefined: Humans will be lead by machines and humans and humans will lead machines and humans alike. So it is good to gave a more integrated view of leadership, management, expert knowledge and technology.