Leader Development and Leadership Development

“Leader development is the expansion of a person’s capacity to be effective in leadership roles and processes. Leadership roles and processes are those that facilitate setting direction, creating alignment, and maintaining commitment in groups of people who share common work” (McCauley and Velsor, 2004)

What develops in leader development that enables him or her to carry out the leadership tasks of setting direction, gaining commitment and creating alignment? Some capabilities reflect how he or she manages his or her own thoughts, feelings, and actions. Some other capabilities reflect how he or she works with others in an organization. Other capabilities, in addition, reflect how he or she facilitates the accomplishment of organizational task.

Outlined below are capabilities that COM 203 – LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT will endeavor to focus your attention and interest you into seeking ways and means of developing them.

1.     Self-Management Capabilities

a.     Self-Awareness

b.     Ability to balance conflicting demands

c.      Ability to learn

d.     Leadership values

2.     Social Capabilities

a.     Ability to build and maintain relationships

b.     Ability to build effective work groups

c.      Communication skills

d.     Ability to develop others

3.     Work Facilitation Capabilities

a.     Management Skills

b.     Ability to think and act strategically

c.      Ability to think creatively

d.     Ability to initiate and implement change

            COM 203 Class plans to approach leadership development as an ongoing process that seeks to expand an organization’s capacity to enact the basic leadership tasks needed for collective work, namely: Setting Direction, Creating Alignment, and Maintaining Commitment. We shall observe that that leadership development is grounded in personal development which is never complete. It is embedded in experience. A leader learns as he or she expands his or her experiences over time. His or her development is facilitated by interventions that are woven into his or her experiences in meaningful ways. This process includes, but goes beyond, his or her leader development. It includes the development of the connections between the leaders, the development of the capacities of teams, the development of connections between teams in an organization, and the development of the culture and systems in which the individual leaders and teams are embedded.

Let us take this journey together for the next three or so months.