7 Responses to the Future of Leadership Development

We recently wrote about 3 changing trends and 3 continuing trends in leadership development in a post titled 6 Future Trends of Leadership Development.  In light of those trends, I’d now like to suggest several actions we should take (or stop taking) in light of these trends.

Personal and Individual

Trends 1 and 2 were that leadership development will become more personal and internal. Individuals will control the topics, pace and budget of leadership development.  How should we as developers respond?

7 Responses

1. Credibility and trust are keys.  We must do things to build credibility and make it easy for individuals to trust us.
2. Old-style “push” self-promotion won’t work.  Neither will interruption marketing.  Our reputation and our certifications may have given us credibility with organizations.  They won’t impress nearly as much with individuals.  We must engage and connect.
3. Our credibility must be open and personal.  We may engage and connect easier than ever online.  But once we begin to do that, we must “be there” regularly and be interested in something larger than just our own content and our own “stuff.”
4. We must share ideas to build credibility.  Sharing is the new advertising.
5. Your ideas must be good.  Check out this cartoon by Hugh MacLeod.
6. Practical is the new “white.”  If nothing else, make your ideas practical. Like a white shirt, practical ideas “go” with anything.
7. Do, Evaluate, Adjust, Repeat.   Iterative learning increases the speed of growth.  The faster you Do, Evaluate, Adjust, Repeat, the faster you grow.

In our next post, we’ll discuss how to make your credibility more practical and applicable in your local community.  It’s rare to develop leaders you have never met.  Because of the ways we spend our time, local credibility is key to maximizing impact.  There are several new responses to this individual, personal, practical approach to leadership development that apply in your local calling area that we can discuss in our next post.

Open Discussion

For today, how else can you respond as a leadership developer in this age of individual, personal, practical leadership development?  Do you have other ideas you can share with the community?  Let’s see if we can share 50 other ideas of how to build credibility and trust in the comments below?  Care to share with us?

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