There is a shortage of effective leadership in all areas of our society… and yet billions of dollars are being invested in leadership training every year.

Leadership Affects Everything!

• Leadership behavior creates the culture or climate that employees work in every day.
• Employee attitudes are affected by their perception of the culture... or how they feel about coming to work each day.
• Talented employees won’t stay in what they perceive to be a negative culture.
• Talented prospective employees won’t choose to join an organization unless it has a reputation of being a great place to work.
• Improving workforce performance is not possible without talented employees.

How employees feel about coming to work, their attitude, is primarily influenced by the climate or culture in which they work. Many managers don’t understand that it is their behavior that creates that climate that their team members work in. And climate, or culture, has a direct impact on business results.

There is no question about the importance of effective leadership, but with so much being invested in leadership training, why have we not seen the appropriate change in behavior and culture? There are two primary reasons.

The Importance of Building Trust is Overlooked
The most basic definition of a leader is one who has followers. No one follows or supports a leader they do not trust. They may stay, but they do not truly support the leader... which is perhaps why Gallup Organization research has identified that only 29% of the American workforce is engaged. The other 71% have stayed, but are either Not-Engaged (55%) or Actively Disengaged (16%).

Most managers do not understand the difference between being trustworthy and building trust. They expect that because they are trustworthy... and they are, in an ethical, moral sense, that people will trust them. Yet they may be going to work every day and destroying whatever trust there is.

For example, a senior manager may perceive that being trustworthy means maximizing shareholder value. An employee, on the other hand, sees a trustworthy manager as someone who values them as a person, and allows them to use their talents and creativity to improve performance. Both points of view are correct, to a degree, but the senior manager who is so focused on being trustworthy to the board and shareholders that employees feel not valued or respected... will destroy employee trust and their engagement and commitment.

Why are 71% of the American workforce Not-Engaged or Actively Disengaged? The level of trust for management is a primary contributing factor.

The second reason leadership training is not achieving behavior and culture change is that...

Behavior Change Takes Time
Leadership training is designed to change leadership behavior, so that business results can be improved. And most management and leadership training provided by internal training departments or external consultants are events... two to five day events with minimal or no follow-up, and it is entirely up to the participant whether they use what they have learned, or not!

According to the authors of Primal Leadership, based on rigorous research, it is not possible to learn to be a more effective leader as a result of a single learning event. Here is what they say:

“The thinking brain can comprehend something after a single hearing or reading. The limbic brain, on the other hand, is a much slower learner – particularly when the challenge is to relearn deeply ingrained habits. The difference matters immensely when trying to improve leadership skills.”

“At their most basic level, those skills come down to habits learned early in life. If those habits are no longer sufficient, or hold a person back, learning takes longer. Reeducating the emotional brain for leadership learning, therefore, requires a different model from what works for the thinking brain: It needs lots of practice and repetition.”

Only a process of development, a series of events with application and reinforcement can be expected to achieve lasting change in leadership behavior.