Leadership is changing. So should leadership development.
Leadership has focused on one kind of leader for decades. It’s the leader with a permanent leadership position, a boss. Those leaders are still with us, but now we have temporary leaders and emergent leaders, too. Leadership development should serve all three.
Leadership development for permanent leaders
Permanent leaders are the ones we talk about most of the time. They’re “promoted†to their position. They’re expected to remain in leadership roles for their entire career as they climb the corporate leader. Almost all of our programs were created for them.
Leadership development for temporary leaders
The people who lead many project teams and task forces are often temporary leaders. They’re individual contributors who take a temporary assignment as a leader. They need special help with things like team formation and leading without permanent positional authority.
Leadership development for emergent leaders
Emergent leaders are a new challenge. We expect team members of all kinds to step up and provide expertise and influence when it will be helpful. That means we have to help everyone in the organization to know when and how to step up.
Today’s leadership world is strange and new, different from the decades that came before in many ways. And we’re just getting started.
