55% of frontline leaders are left out of leadership training! That means the people leading the most people are least likely to receive leadership training…WHAT?!

“Leadership development opportunities for people not labelled as “high potential”: 

45% of leaders receive the majority of leadership development opportunities. 

55% of leaders are left behind 

More than half of leaders are left out  

- If leaders want more training, they better hope they get labeled as a high potential.   

-five percent of frontline leaders are formally identified as being part of their organization’s high-potential pool, which means they get twice as much funding and 25 percent more development hours each year.” 

When I saw the above in report issued by DDI’s Frontline Leader Project, oooh did I get irritated. 

There are many things that bug me about this information. 

I want to discuss just one of them: ‘high potential’ leaders.  I understand why organizations feel the need to categorize people using important sounding words like ‘high potential’ or ‘emerging’.  This practice focuses more training and mentoring resources into people deemed as most worthy of the effort. 

Since my bias is already being revealed in the words I just chose, I am just going to go for it: in general, I find this elitist and anti-inclusive in the extreme. 

I have been in meetings where ‘high potential’ employees are identified and discussed.  Never has the discussion included reports or data.  This is what those meetings look like: high-level executives brainstorm names, each person will give a few sentences about why they put the name up, if there are a few head nods then the person gets a little star.  Someone gets an action to compile the list, and the agenda moves on.  What happens next? People on the list might get assigned a mentor or invited to a multi-day leadership training retreat (nice).  What happens to the names not on the short list?  Maybe they will get invited to the next round of training.  What happens to the people who didn’t make the list at all?  They are left out of leadership training and mentoring programs all together.  Notice: no fact-based reviews, no nomination process, no complete starting list of names to make sure everyone is (at the very least) considered for a first cut…just who pops to mind at the time.  I have never seen a conversation designed to challenge with a question like: “Why not?”.  If so-and-so is not ready to be part of this elite subset of leaders now, what is being done to help them be ready in the future?  Is there a capability, capacity, and/or a willingness issue?  What should be done to address it? Have accountabilities and responsibilities for building leadership capabilities across the organization been established in a meaningful, measurable, and proactive manner? 

Phew, ok…getting back to the Frontline Leader Project report… 

Data from DDI Frontline Leader Project Report, Graphic by Laura Cooley

The study data shows:

• The vast majority of leadership development resources go to only 5% of the leaders in an organization. 

• 95% of leaders get half as much funding as the 5%. 

• Of that 95%, 45% will get leadership training and what the other 55% receives is negligible.  

Doesn’t make sense, does it?  But I have seen this happen.  Lower-tier leaders purposefully excluded from training time and time again. 

Ever hear this: “Our managers are not good leaders!” or “It is a leadership issue!”  My answer…”Well, duh.” 

How about this one: “We are committed to equal opportunity.”  I say…”Are  you? These numbers and the process used to get there simply do not support that.” 

Here is another problem for me: when word gets out, management has inadvertently (but effectively) communicated to those 95% that management does not see ‘enough’ potential in that person to spend money and resources training her or him. 

Not only that, only 45% percent of those “high-potential” people will be given training opportunities to increase their leadership skills; the other 55%...nada.  How does this motivate the majority of an organization’s leaders to become better? How does this build your leadership capacity?  Your pipeline for the future?  Employee engagement?  Client service?  Organizational sustainability?!  Anyone else smell a fundamental problem? 

My opinion: ditch “high potential” and “emerging” leaders from your organization’s vernacular.  The language is exclusive by nature.  Use something else, just make sure it doesn’t hamper the enthusiasm and motivation of the rest of your leaders.  Better, have an ongoing, never-ending leadership program blending training, mentorship, evaluations, stretch projects and other development opportunities for everyone; the entire organization will benefit and those ‘high potentials’ will rise to the top naturally, based on merit and not proximity to the most verbose executive sponsors. 

Focus first, repeatedly, and always on teaching people how to work together.    

“The way a team plays together as a whole determines its success.  You may have the greatest bunch of individual stars in the world, but if they don’t play together, the club won’t be worth a dime.”

-- Babe Ruth 

Leadership development is an on-going journey; everyone has something to learn and practice.  Simply graduating from a program does not mean you are a good leader. 

Stay tuned for more excerpts from my upcoming book!