A Leadership Education and Dialogue Model: Creating a Learning Organization for Continuous Leadership Development

As the title suggests, this case describes the conditions leading up to, and the implementation of, a new model for continuous leadership development. Past experience with a 360-degree developmental feedback pilot, and guiding principles established by an internal learning organization, had identified the need for a new leadership development model that allowed for partnership and accountability between new leaders and their managers and staff. By treating the expectations of staff as valid data to be acted upon in the external environment, we learned that leaders are better able to live competencies such as creating a customer service environment and fostering teamwork. We also learned about the importance of creating vehicles and processes that inculcate the concept of leader as teacher and employee as customer. For example, the competency of "foster teamwork" is lived by requiring participating leaders to meet with their managers and staff before a class intervention to obtain perceptions of team and operational performance. After class, leaders are also expected to meet with staff to share back the analyzed data and partner with them to put an action plan into practice. Often these action plans include working with teams to clarify goals or involve them in implementing new initiatives. The case highlights two specific programs in which this education and dialogue model have been implemented. [Download PDF]