The Changing Nature of Management and Leadership Training - Part 3

In my previous two blogs on leadership and management in more traditional v tech/knowledge-based industries, I discussed how leaders and managers in different types of organisation have very different remits, and so need to have very different styles and skills.

It’s not that one way is right and the other is wrong. Leadership/management style is either appropriate or not for the industry you work in. And this brings me (finally) back to the original question “How has Management and Leadership Training changed in the last 25 years?”

When I started my career, it was in a regulated industry in a traditional business. People (generally) liked to be told what to do. Yes, they liked to have a little flexibility to add their own style, but generally, having a checklist explaining what was acceptable, what wasn’t and what good looked like was appreciated. It still is. Experienced people are still generally respected, and traditional training – both on and off the job, being guided by an expert still works. These people can’t learn at their desk. They often don’t have a desk. Many don’t have easy access to tech. Training needs to be formal and planed in advance BUT that doesn’t mean it’s all chalk and talk…’traditional’ training is much more interactive and much more respectful of the experience in the room that it was 25 years ago.

In the creative/knowledge-based industries, leaders still need to be made aware of the boundaries they shouldn’t cross, but so much more is self-discovered, so much more is being created as we go. Training has to be much more reactive to give people (and the business) what they need rather than being able to create development far in advance because roles (and so training needs) are not so clearly defined. Learning is much more in the moment because the pace of change is so much faster. There is no single expert to turn to – everyone is an expert at something, so L&Ds role is much more about connecting people together in a meaningful way.

And that’s where I think too much generalising about leadership and management training is dangerous. Too many people seem to suggest that a more traditional approach is not effective. Naturally, it’s not effective in a creative, tech-centred, knowledge-based business. Of course digital learning, peer learning is the right thing to do. It fits how the business works. However, a self-serve , on-line, peer-discovery approach to L&D will be less effective in more traditional industries. For safety and/or regulation requirements, people need to be signed off. Even in terms of process and behaviour, there needs to be a consistency across sites, and that means formal training – they can’t just do what they think is best. The consequences could be catastrophic.

So the difficult thing for trainers is that there’s no single right way to approach L&D, it very much depends on your industry.