Are leadership courses worth it? Leadership courses are worth it if you make them work. Not all leadership courses are equal. Some leadership courses are worth every centavo you invest in. Others cause migraines as speakers drone for hours talking about nonsense.
I have attended public seminars where speakers dumped information. I have joined webinars during the pandemic where speakers pitch expensive leadership courses but do not teach anything helpful.
On the other hand, some leadership courses, some of which are for free, provide enormous value. Just like everything we do in life, we have to choose well.
Here are four simple ways to pick the best leadership courses for you.
First, tailor-fit your leadership courses to the need of your organization. In-house training is almost always much better than public offerings because public offerings cater to the general public. The content of these leadership courses focuses on volume, not depth.
Many organizations offer customized training programs. But they don’t mean the same things. There are those who change logos, colors, and photos so these elements are aligned with your corporate brand.
But what they offer are canned programs purchased from the US of A. I know that many Filipinos love programs from the US of A. I understand that leading training providers are in that country. Google prioritized them on search too.
Customize training programs to fit your needs and culture. Use the global concepts, but make the application local.
Second, align your leadership courses to the leadership competency of your organization. Some leadership courses help you master leadership skills. Pay more attention to the leadership competencies that support your organizational strategy.
Competencies are performance enablers. Competencies are specific to leadership roles.
For example, you can find many communication courses online. Most of these courses pay attention to concepts and hacks. Learning new concepts may not help your team leaders, managers, and CEO. Each of them need a specific set of communication skills.
If you have not yet mapped your corporate competencies, it is important that you start there. The fastest way to do this is to go to your people. Ask them to help you identify the skills they need to succeed at their present jobs. Ask their bosses and subordinates too.
Hit and miss training programs require multi-days of training. That is because these training programs give you more misses than hits.
Start with a few competencies. An hour of training on writing purpose-driven emails, for example, is more powerful than a three-day training on business communication.
Third, get leadership courses that train you on how to practice vital behaviors. Vital behaviors are those actions you need to practice so you can become a more effective leader.
If you don’t know the target two or three behaviors changes, then it is likely there is none. To change our results, we must change our behaviors. Without behavior change, your leadership training will fail.
To identify vital behaviors, consider all the actions leaders must do to perform. Which ones are crucial to high-performance?
Fourth, If you cannot bring a tailor-fit program to your organization, find courses that help you learn a single leadership skill aligned to your organization’s leadership competency. Find out what kind of behavior change that training promises to offer.
Are leadership courses worth it? The answer is yes if you deliberately use criteria for identifying courses that work.
Choose your next adventure:
Remember, remember leadership courses that work help leaders achieve goals.
