The 4 steps to leadership development success from McKinsey

Emma Weber

I was so excited to see in the latest McKinsey Quarterly: “WHAT’S MISSING IN LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT?”

Because – drum roll please – number 3 on the list to leadership development success is the transfer of learning! Cue celebratory dance mid-article.

McKinsey quote a recent Fortune survey, which found that only 7% of CEOs think their organisations are developing effective leaders. Likewise, McKinsey’s latest global survey found only 11% of executives believed their leadership development initiatives are creating the desired results.

They suggest that there is no magic pièce de résistance and that many things must be in place to create leadership development success at scale.

Self aware leaders able to adapt and adjust behaviour are four times as likely to lead change effectively.

McKinsey’s 4 key steps that are missing in leadership development are:

1. Focusing on the behavior that really matters, based on context

2. Ensuring sufficient reach across the organization

3. Designing for the transfer of learning (yay!)

4. Using system reinforcement to lock in change

They found that organisations with successful leadership development programs are much more likely to have in place a requirement that leaders apply their learning into the context of their job role and workplace.

Furthermore McKinsey observed that successful leadership development programs were three times as likely to be providing coaching to support leaders with this requirement.

In our recent Learning Transfer Research we looked into the rise of the workplace coach in supporting the transfer of learning.

We found that twice as many learning leaders are finding their organisation’s investment in learning is far superior when leaders practice and demonstrate coaching at every level.

It is clear coaching will be essential in creating personalised and successful learning transfer support for all programs including leadership development within organisations. And with coaching at the heart of our efficient and effective Turning Learning into Action methodology we are well placed to help organisations develop this skill internally or deliver externally as required.