Leaders Teaching Leaders

As organizations leverage the valuable experience of their leaders as teachers, they should implement an instructionally sound framework that addresses the technical and emotional needs of all stakeholders.

You’ve been trying to convince your senior leaders for some time now that they have much to offer in teaching other leaders in your organization. By actively sharing their experiences and perspectives on the company’s values and expectations, they send an unmistakable message of commitment to the company’s success and to growing its leadership pipeline.

Now you’ve finally gotten your chance. You are sitting across the desk from one of those executives, who has agreed to participate in your newly developed high-visibility senior leadership academy as a presenter. You’re simultaneously excited and terrified: excited because you know the value that executives can bring to the program and terrified because you want to have a highly engaging learning experience, not a death-by-PowerPoint presentation or an unfocused stream-of-consciousness agenda.

Sure, many executives have risen to the top because of their ability to charismatically communicate and present to their teams, boardrooms and customers. But can they facilitate a real learning experience?

There are really only two factors that will influence the success of a leaders-teaching-leaders initiative. The first involves the creation of a simple, adaptable framework that facilitates the type of breakthrough learning experience you desire. The second factor addresses the emotional element of making executives comfortable doing something that may not come naturally: truly engaging the leaders in their audience.

Not Presentation Skills

With some direction, executives can learn the basics of creating engaging, meaningful and action-oriented learning experiences based on any content they want to present. Now, this isn’t about teaching presentation skills. We assume these leaders already know how to present, as it’s something they’ve likely been doing for years. This is about learning to facilitate a session that participants will remember and internalize.