Leadership Development Circles

𝐅𝐞𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐢𝐬𝐨𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐝 𝐚𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐭𝐨𝐩 𝐢𝐬 𝐚 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐩 𝐟𝐚𝐢𝐥𝐮𝐫𝐞, 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐚 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐨𝐧𝐞. 𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐢𝐬 𝐰𝐡𝐲. In today's disruptive, fast-paced world, detailed analysis and old best practices often fall short. Leaders are left feeling frustrated and isolated, grappling with challenges that no one prepared them for. I've seen it firsthand: the brilliant leader who feels they must have all the answers, bearing the weight of their role alone. This isolation is the enemy of innovation and resilience. So, where can leaders go to get real-time support and guidance to overcome these challenges? The answer often lies within their own organization, hidden in plain sight. The transformative power of 𝐏𝐞𝐞𝐫 𝐋𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐂𝐢𝐫𝐜𝐥𝐞𝐬 - small, facilitated cohorts where leaders learn from one another. This isn't another top-down training program. It's a structured, peer-driven process that delivers profound results because it's built on genuine human connection and shared experience. Through my work facilitating these circles, I've observed three non-negotiable pillars that make them a success: 1. 𝐏𝐬𝐲𝐜𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐒𝐚𝐟𝐞𝐭𝐲: The facilitator's first and most critical job is to build a confidential, non-judgmental space where leaders can be vulnerable and authentic. This is the bedrock of everything that follows. 2. 𝐒𝐭𝐫𝐮𝐜𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐞𝐝 𝐏𝐞𝐞𝐫 𝐂𝐨𝐚𝐜𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠: Each session, a leader brings a real challenge. The group then engages in a process of deep listening and powerful questioning, helping to reframe the issue and uncover new paths forward. You're not just getting advice; you're developing empathy and new ways of thinking. 3. 𝐂𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐖𝐢𝐬𝐝𝐨𝐦: These circles intentionally bring together leaders from different functions, sites, and backgrounds. This diversity breaks down silos and smashes echo chambers, bringing fresh perspectives that can reveal blind spots and new opportunities you might never have considered on your own. Leaders feel heard, recognize their struggles are shared, and build a network that fuels both personal resilience and organizational performance. Your growth as a leader doesn't have to be a solitary journey. True, sustainable development happens in a community. You are one conversation away from a new perspective. 𝐅𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐨𝐰 𝐦𝐞 Diane for more frameworks on high-performance leadership. 𝐑𝐞𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐭 this to your network to spread the idea. #PeerLearning #LeadershipDevelopment #ExecutiveCoaching #PeerCoaching #LeadershipCircles #TalentManagement #FutureOfWork #LinkedIn

The leadership tool that changed how I lead. The circle of control. The circle of influence. I use it with managers, my team and for myself more than anything else and it never gets old. Retail throws a lot at you. Decisions made by Founders, Directors and Senior Leaders. Pressures outside your hands. Things that feel urgent but aren't yours to own. It's easy to spend your energy in the wrong places and not even realise you're doing it. That's where the two circles come in. Draw a circle. Inside it goes everything you can directly control. How you lead your team today. The standards you hold. The culture you create on your shop floor. The experience your customer has when they walk through the door. You’ll be surprised how big you need to draw this circle because when you think of everything, there’s actually so much within your control that can influence how your team feel, what your customers experience and ultimately the results you can generate. Draw a bigger circle around it. That's your influence. These are the things you can shape, input on, give feedback on and have a voice in, even if the final call isn't yours. On the outer edges of both circles, you write down the things that you can neither control, nor influence. Everything outside both circles? It doesn't get your energy. When a manager completes this activity, their eyes are opened. They stop worrying about things that were never theirs to worry about to begin with. Their energy goes into the things that they can have a direct impact on. They get clearer on their priorities. Their stress drops. Their team feels more settled because their leader is. The focus that was being lost to frustration goes back where it belongs, into the work they can actively control and impact. That's the bit I love most about this tool. It doesn't just help you lead better. It helps you protect yourself in a role that whilst can be very rewarding, can also be extremely demanding. This tool changed how I lead, helping me realise where my energy is best spent. It’s my most recommended leadership tool because I've also watched it change how others lead too. I've dropped an example of one that was completed at Lush below. What's your go-to leadership tool? Drop it below, I'm always looking for new ones 👇 #RetailLeadership #LeadershipDevelopment #ShopManagement

If you’re leading at the executive level, this model should be printed on your desk, revisited every Monday and taught to every manager you promote. It looks deceptively simple. But the consequences of misunderstanding it are anything but. The Circle of Concern: contains every news headline, competitor rumor, shareholder whisper, and internal drama you hear but can’t do anything about. The Circle of Influence: includes your team, your culture, and the conversations you’re not having but should be. And the Circle of Control: the smallest and most ignored of all; holds your time, your focus, your personal leadership hygiene. Here’s the paradox I’ve seen across 20 years of coaching C-suite leaders: The more senior someone becomes, the more likely they are to spend time outside their own circle. They start focusing on market conditions they can’t shift, employee narratives they haven’t addressed directly, and perception battles that drain energy but produce no clarity. Most leaders are rewarded early in their careers for “being in the know.” Later, they become so fluent in absorbing concern that they lose fluency in directing action. In leadership intensives, I often draw this diagram and ask: “Where are you leaking energy right now?” 9/10 times, the answer is the outer ring, concern without action. So I teach this discipline. Start your week with 3 questions: 1. What am I worrying about that I cannot control, and need to release? 2. Where am I quietly influencing outcomes, but haven’t claimed responsibility? 3. What’s fully in my control that I keep deferring, avoiding, or underutilizing? If you’re a founder scaling fast, a CEO under pressure, or a leader navigating change, your growth won’t come from controlling more. It will come from knowing precisely what’s yours to carry, and what isn’t. And in complex systems, your influence grows not by chasing every signal, but by mastering your own. 📩 I coach executive teams to build strategic clarity, emotional precision, and decision frameworks that stop the energy leaks before they spread. If your bandwidth feels maxed but your impact feels diluted, this is where we start. #leadership #executivecoaching #ceocoach #thoughtleader

In the last couple years, I’ve spoken to 100+ heads of leadership development about their emerging leader programs, and I noticed something interesting: —> There are three different types of emerging leader programs. Each type is VERY distinct. It has a different: - goal - audience makeup - curriculum - measure of success Here are the three types: ___ 🔵 Engaging Individual Contributors (ICs) These programs aim to engage & retain ICs. The idea is to let in as many ICs as possible and train them in high-value self-leadership skills. How do you choose the right skills? 📌 You choose self-leadership skills that will improve engagement (think EQ, Growth Mindset, and Resilience). ___ 🟢 Exploring 1st-Line Leadership These programs aim to engage ICs AND promote a segment into leadership. The idea is to cast a wide net. That way you engage a large % of top talent AND a subpopulation of your cohort gets promoted. How do you balance engagement with leadership preparedness? 📌 You blend together self-leadership skills and on-the-job exposure (think job shadowing, mentorships, and manager conversations). ___ 🟠 1st-Line Leadership Fast Track These programs aim to fill for 1st-line leader attrition. The idea is to take a small, selective cohort and promote as many people into leadership as possible. How do you properly prepare these leaders when they don’t have a team to practice with? 📌 You give on-the-job exposure AND you use a slew of practice tactics (think simulations, role plays, and observation exercises) ___ No type is "wrong or right" or "best or worst." Each type is "right" and "best" when it aligns with your business needs. So take your time choosing, then stay in your lane! #leadershipdevelopment P.S. The BEST example I’ve seen, and the setup I highly recommend, is at Ferring. Mark Gibson and his team employ both 1&3: 1. A program devoted to a deep dive on self-leadership skills open to all ICs Followed by... 2. A smaller, more selective cohort to fill leadership positions The result? You don't have to split your focus to try to accomplish both goals (like you do in the middle option).

Leader development doesn't happen just because they show up in an office. Leadership development is a key challenge for many firms, including a lot of hybrid and remote-first organizations that I work with. Managers don't know how to lead distributed teams, leaders who are under pressure to deliver and don't have time to learn, and gaps in who gets mentored -- and who doesn't. Michael Hudson and a team from Hudson Institute of Coaching have a case study on how they helped a global consulting firm build an environment that drove development into how people worked. Highlights below, and you should really read the details -- it's well structured and thought through: 🔸 Structured peer learning: Curated 6 person groups, diverse in experiences, backgrounds, and perspectives; "learning pods that might never have formed organically in a physical office." 🔸 Embedded development: Weekly 15 minute practices to build habits, continual learning and reinforcement. 🔸 Expert-facilitated sessions: Monthly structured forums for group learning and peer conversations. Expert coaches can help you get deeper, faster. 🔸 Competency-Focused Curriculum:  Targeted specific leadership skills, especially around issues like belonging among diverse populations and in distributed teams. Check out the article, linked in comments. Also, I'd personally recommend Hudson Institute of Coaching. I found their LifeForward program to be immensely impactful, and know a number of incredible certified coaches who have been through their program. #Leadership #Development #Coaching #Coach #FutureOfWork

Lets commit to developing leadership skills in EVERY employee! Leadership development programmes and initiatives are not just for formal existing leaders. They are for everyone. If you think about it... Leadership skills encompass more than just the ability to guide others; they're fundamentally about self-management and fostering effective collaboration. We need entire teams to be able to think critically, problem-solve and communicate effectively. We want emotionally intelligent individuals on every team. So...we need to cultivate these traits across entire teams—not just within individual leaders. But how? And how do we do this without sending training costs sky-high? Here are some simple tips that can be implemented with no cost, just intentional time and effort: 👉 Take a developmental approach in your coaching check-ins; help people to understand and develop key leadership qualities such as decision-making, communication, problem-solving, and team management. Use competency wheels or other self-assessment tools to help people identify their leadership strengths and areas for development. 👉 Pair employees with existing leader mentors within the organization who can explain leadership and provide guidance and support to those in non-formal leader roles. 👉 Provide cross-functional opportunities for everyone to expose them to different parts of the organization and help them understand the business more holistically. 👉 Cultivate an environment where it's normal for people to ask for feedback on their performance and receive it. Existing leaders can lead the way by asking for feedback on their own performance, which teaches non formal leaders to do the same. 👉 Give every employee the opportunity to take on leadership roles in smaller projects or teams. This distributed leadership approach provides a practical training ground for people, giving them a chance to experience leadership in a controlled, manageable environment. 👉 Encourage self-initiated learning in everyone! Support and encourage employees to seek out learning opportunities themselves, whether through online courses, industry conferences, or by taking on new challenges within the company. What are your top tips for building leadership skills in everyone? Leave your thoughts in the comments 🙏 #promotion #leaderdevelopment #retention #motivation #culture #organisationalbehaviour #coaching #crosstraining #talentmanagement

If leadership development momentum is dependent on the department/vendor/person sustaining the efforts, then it's a program to complete, not a system that builds leaders. Leadership development should create more leaders. Here's some ways to integrate sustained leadership development: • Structures for internal coaching networks • Learning channels with internal contributions and strong tagging • Frameworks for micro-discovery/debrief in weekly meetings • Unified language, frameworks, and resources for enhanced collaboration • Systems for train the trainer (co-facilitation opportunities too) The goal is to help leaders learn to drive development. These are cost-effective, time-effective, and impact-effective ways that help build learning infrastructure rather than programs. What are some of the other ways that you build sustained leadership development within your organization?

“You are known by the company you keep.” We’ve heard this for years. But here’s the real question: Is your circle aligned with who you are becoming… or who you have been? Most professionals aim for 3 things: • Better opportunities • Higher compensation • Meaningful growth / promotion And we obsess over skills to get there. But here’s the truth no one says enough: Skills open doors. People decide how far you go inside the room. If you are serious about growth—and building real executive presence— your network cannot be accidental. It has to be intentional. Here are the 5 people you need in your circle if you want to grow into your next version: 1. The Expander The one who is already where you want to be. They don’t just advise you. They normalise a bigger life for you. Being around them shifts your standards without a conversation. 2. The Challenger The one who calls you out. They don’t let you hide behind excuses, overthinking, or “I’m not ready.” They push you to speak, show up, and take space. 3. The Mirror The one who gives you honest feedback. Not flattery. Not comfort. But clear reflection of how you are perceived. This is where executive presence is actually built. 4. The Connector The one who opens doors. They think in terms of: “Who should you meet?” not “What should you do?” They expand your world faster than effort alone ever can. 5. The Safe Space The one where you can be unfiltered. No performance. No pressure. Just space to process, reset, and rebuild. Because growth without grounding leads to burnout. Here’s the shift most people miss: Networking is not collecting contacts. It is curating influence around you. So pause and ask yourself: Do you have these 5 people in your life right now? Or are you trying to build your next level… with your current circle? Because the fastest way to elevate your presence… is to elevate the people you are consistently present with. If this made you reflect, let’s build a network that matches the leader you are becoming. #archanaparmar #leadershippresence #executivepresence

What happens after a leadership offsite or workshop is over and everyone goes back to their desks? What’s next? In late November I got a WhatsApp message from Michael Trautmann. He and Swantje Allmers, CEO of New Work Masterskills (NWMS), are running a highly successful leadership program at a global German company. And they were looking for a way to build on the positive momentum they created. “We can imagine offering a WOL for Leaders (10 weeks) as part of the program. We develop it together. What do you think?” I said yes immediately. ** The concept ** Way back in 2017, Katharina Krentz and I created a method for leaders while she was at Bosch. We focused on improving a leader’s digital skills and used a reverse mentoring format, pairing junior people with leaders. It was useful, but leaders had more pressing issues. Working with a truly enlightened team at the company who commissioned the new program, led by Sascha Schmid, Dörte Wickenhagen, and Niko V., we decided our program shouldn’t try to mold participants into being a particular kind of leader. Rather, we designed a way they could each become, through practice together with their peers, the kind of leader they aspire to be. ** WOL for Leaders ** This new method has a similar format as other WOL methods, though with a completely different purpose and content. > A Personal Goal: In WOL for Leaders, each participant defines their own personal leadership vision—What kind of leader do they want to be?—and works throughout their Circle to bring that vision to life. > Small Groups: Circles consist of four to five leaders. > A Structured Curriculum: Each week there are stories, exercises, and discussions with themes including motivation, performance management, innovation, and team management. There are also actions to take in between meetings. > Practice Over Time: Over three months, ten “leadership conversations” gradually shift from Self-Leadership to One-on-One Leadership to Team Leadership. Then we offer the Circle structured formats for continuing to meet and support each other. By the end, each participant has worked on their personal leadership vision, practiced skills to bring that vision to life, and created a trusted peer support network that will help them long after the leadership program has ended. ** What’s next? ** Some companies, like our first pilot, will use WOL for Leaders to complement their existing leadership programs. Others will use it as a replacement for individual coaching or external executive networks, or to make leadership development accessible to a much wider audience than they could reach otherwise. In all of these cases, we customize the method, tailoring it so it includes skills that are important to them and aligns with their goals and values. There are over 50,000 books telling you what leadership is. In WOL for Leaders, you build skills and relationships to become the kind of leader *you* aspire to be. #workingoutloud #WOLforLeaders

Congratulations on completing the first book in your Leadership Development Journey! It’s exciting to see a company like Walbro LLC, Grand Rapids investing in leadership growth and fostering a shared vision. As you move forward with Blake Brown’s journey, it’s important to keep the momentum going with a clear focus on both individual and collective development. Here are some suggestions to help you create a cohesive and effective leadership development path: 1. Establish Core Leadership Principles • Define Core Values: Ensure that everyone shares a common understanding of the leadership values you’re trying to instill. This could be integrity, accountability, empathy, or innovation. The key is that these values align with both the organization’s goals and the personal growth aspirations of your leaders. • Create a Leadership Framework: Develop a simple but comprehensive framework that explains what leadership looks like at Walbro. This could include leadership behaviors, actions, and mindset shifts, all of which should be demonstrated consistently at all levels. 2. Create a Shared Language • Consistent Communication: Encourage leaders to use the same language in daily conversations. When everyone is on the same page, it’s easier to share ideas, set expectations, and address challenges. 3. Engage in Continuous Learning • Group Learning Sessions: Organize regular book clubs, study groups, or workshops where leaders can reflect on concepts and discuss how to apply them. This allows for deeper understanding and the exchange of ideas. • Mentorship Programs: Pair leaders at different levels to share insights and support each other’s growth. This can create an environment of continuous learning and personal development. 4. Promote Self-Reflection and Accountability • Personal Leadership Plans: Have each leader create a personal leadership development plan based on the lessons learned. Set measurable goals and hold each other accountable for progress. 5. Foster Team Collaboration • Leadership Committees: Form cross-functional leadership teams to take ownership of different aspects of the leadership journey, such as training, communication, and initiatives that impact your team members, customers, and overall business. • Celebrate Wins Together: Make leadership development a collective effort by celebrating milestones as a team, not just individual achievements. This reinforces the importance of working together toward a shared vision. By building on the shared vision you’ve already established, integrating Blake Brown’s teachings, and fostering a culture of continuous development, you can create a powerful leadership foundation that will benefit your team, your customers, and the business as a whole. Keep up the great work, and good luck on your next steps! #leadership #leadershipdevelopment #operationalexcellence #coaching #training