There’s a frequent misconception at the heart of common leadership development practice – and it’s the idea that an approach that’s fundamentally based on ‘training’ will succeed in generating the new mindsets and behaviours that you are hoping for. This mistake leads clients and providers alike to go ahead with ‘pushing content’, only to find that, like water off a duck’s back, it doesn’t sink in. Why is this?

A new paper* indicates that the vast majority of people see ‘removing inner barriers’ as more important than exposure to content-led learning when it comes to developing as a leader.*

What do we mean by inner barriers? These are the combination of limiting assumptions, fears, hidden commitments, and areas of self-doubt that we carry around with us, that are unique to each of us. And so the message is that layering on new knowledge from the outside isn’t as helpful as tuning in to what’s going on inside.

“We definitely meet some participants who get benefit from seeing new content. But so many other leaders we work with are being held back by internal mental models that restrict their progress. Giving people the time and space to notice, describe and experiment with these is hugely productive,” says Tim Janisch, Director of Leadership and Team Development at Q5.

Removing Barriers

So if the real work of developing as leader is removing inner barriers, there are a few established practices that need to play a major role in development programmes:

Coaching is one way to hyper-personalise the development experience. It gives leaders a space to see their situation clearly and in new ways, to filter what’s real from what’s imagined, to strengthen their self-identity as a leader, and explore the ways they might move forward.

Experiential learning is a powerful way to facilitate learning without teaching, by creating scenarios that allow leaders to notice how they act in certain situations. This self-awareness helps people to care about doing something different, which is a necessary driver for personal change.

Action learning allows participants to deliver real work whilst paying deliberate attention to how they are going about it. This facilitated style of learning helps leaders to confront and overcome inner barriers as they carry out work – learning by doing.

The theme behind all these approaches is to facilitate leaders to find their way towards their most effective self. The content of the programme is a map, but everyone needs to find their own path across it.

Chloe Cardon, Principal Consultant at Q5, said “Our most impactful work is where leaders have space in the programme to become aware of their underlying beliefs, and to work with facilitators or their colleagues to enhance those.”*PaQ5, has released

*Paper from Q5

www.q5partners.com