Here is a real-life leadership development plan example template and how you can use it to create an organization-wide leadership development program that is impactful and delivers measurable results
Case study: Agilent Technologies, leadership development plan
How do Human Resources, talent management, or leadership development professionals develop and implement an impactful organization-wide leadership development plan and have a measurable return on investment?
The planning and implementation of Agilent’s coaching program named APEX (Accelerated Performance for Executives) – has some valuable lessons for any company that wants to invest in its leadership development and get a guaranteed and measurable return.
They coached over a hundred leaders using the worldwide pool of coaches over two-and-a-half years. 95% of the leaders who went through the program showed improved overall leadership effectiveness, as measured by the anonymous feedback from raters.
The worldwide leadership development plan example
Agilent Technologies, a spinoff of Hewlett Packard, deployed a worldwide corporate leadership development program for their high-performing and high-potential senior leaders. Key features included were –
- Defining their leadership competencies
- Customized 360-degree feedback for their leadership competencies
- Using executive coaching as a part of leadership development
- An international network of external coaches
- Measurement of coaching effectiveness
- An interesting clause of “pay for results.”
Leadership coaching and “pay for results” clause
The “pay for results” clause ensured leadership growth for the leader, or else the coach would not get paid (except for incidentals).
Hewlett Packard had previously used coaching as part of leadership development but in an unstructured and uncoordinated way. Multiple vendors and individual coaching practitioners had different coaching approaches and different price points.
Read: How to find the best executive coach for you or for the leaders in your organization
Defining Agilent Global Leadership Profile
Agilent defined a set of competencies and profiles across all management levels – first-line managers through top business leaders. Over several months and through an iterative process comprising managers’ inputs, review of documents, discussions, and refinements, a Global Leadership Profile was developed. A senior manager then checked and confirmed this profile in each of the company’s divisions in the US and abroad.
Initial Objectives of the APEX coaching program
Along with developing the leadership profiles, an initial draft of the leadership coaching was also being developed. They outlined the initial objectives of the coaching program as follows –
- Focus on senior managers and executives – Participants of the APEX coaching included VPs, GMs, directors, and BUHs.
- Global reach – the program should be accessible by all Agilent locations in sixty countries. Ideally, provide local coaches that speak the local language and understand the local culture.
- Flexible and user-friendly To make it easy for them, they created end-users a menu of options. The user can choose from 2 to 3 local coaches and avail multiple coaching options at different levels and budgets. They simplified everything for the user to hire a coach and make the payments.
- Accountability – As the company was investing in the employee’s development via leadership coaching, the participants would have to show measurable growth in leadership effectiveness as rated by their subordinates, peers, and superiors.
The final version of APEX – the cultural based leadership development program plan example
Critical factors for developing a leadership development program may include many factors. Over several months and after going through several iterations, they outlined a final version of the APEX coaching program that included
- Several coaching options
- General description of each option
- A global coaching pool of qualified coaches
- Guidance for the 360-degree feedback process
- Creating intranet pages with all these details
- The official launch of the program and internal marketing
- Educating HR and leadership development team within the organization
It was also decided that APEX will not be used for career planning or remedial coaching. The purpose of APEX was to improve leadership behaviors only. And this is critical for any leadership development plan example. Keep career planning or performance management separate from leadership developmental activities.
Five Coaching Options
Five coaching options were made available, and the names were coined using the mountain-climbing analogy.
| Base Camp | Multi-rater GLP assessment | 2-4 hour face-to-face coaching | Review report and create an IDP | No, check-in with stakeholders | n/a | No results guarantee |
| Camp 2 | Multi-rater GLP assessment | Six months of telephone & in-person coaching | One mini-survey as follow up assessment | Coach has a telephone check-in with key stakeholders | n/a | Guaranteed results |
| Camp 3 | Multi-rater GLP assessment | Six months of telephone & in-person coaching | One mini-survey as follow up assessment | Coach has a telephone check-in with key stakeholders. | Coach conduct up to 12 interviews with key stakeholders on the leader’s behaviors and shares the report. | Guaranteed results |
| High Camp | Multi-rater GLP assessment | One Year telephone & in-person coaching | Two mini-surveys as follow up assessment. | Coach has a telephone check-in with key stakeholders | n/a | Guaranteed results |
| Summit | Multi-rater GLP assessment | One Year telephone & in-person coaching | Two mini-surveys as follow up assessment | Coach has a telephone check-in with key stakeholders. | Coach conduct up to 12 interviews with key stakeholders on the leader’s behaviors and shares the report. | Guaranteed results |
| Team coaching | Multi-rater GLP assessment | Group coaching sessions | Two mini-surveys | Participants cross-check with one another. | Participants conduct interviews with one another. | Guaranteed results |
There was also an option to upgrade to the next higher level option with no penalty. Besides, several add-on options were made available, including additional interviews, instruments, and team and group-based experiences.
The most popular option was the High Camp. Many line managers nominated their entire team for team coaching.
Results-Guarantee Clause of the leadership development program
All but one APEX coaching program options including a unique clause of guaranteed results. The leader didn’t have to pay until the entire coaching program was completed and only if the leader had improved as assessed by the leader’s stakeholders via the min-surveys. There was a “leader qualification” process to gauge the leader’s commitment to avail of the no-growth no-pay option. The coaching program manager conducts a brief interview with the potential coachee leader to assess specific needs and assess genuine interest. This also helps the program manager recommend suitable coaches. Participating leaders have a choice of coaches and also have a sense of ownership in their development process.
Internal marketing
The following efforts of internal marketing and easy access helped spread the word about the APEX program.
- Availability of all relevant details and documents on the intranet
- Presentations to HR and leadership development team within Agilent
- Word of mouth publicity of the measurable results and results guaranteed clause.
Involving the stakeholders in the leadership development program
It was a known fact that regular follow-up with key stakeholders results in a perceived leadership effectiveness improvement. Involving stakeholders of the leader before, during, and after is an excellent process to help change the leader’s behaviors and stakeholder’s perceptions.
The leader conducted an initial debriefing session lasting 5-10 minutes with each stakeholder with the following agenda.
- Thanking raters for providing anonymous 360-degree input
- Relating the positive and developmental feedback
- Disclosing the developmental goal(s)
- Enlisting the rater’s help in the participant’s developmental efforts
Leaders also follow up with stakeholders regularly, usually at least once a month, throughout the coaching engagement.
Measuring effectiveness through mini-survey
Mini surveys are anonymous and include short 3-5 questions. Did the leader improve? Raters respond on a Likert scale of -3 to +3. They also solicited some qualitative comments. Mini surveys are also used to determine whether the leader has improved – so that the coach can get paid as per the no-growth no-pay clause.
Results from the APEX program
Has this leader become more or less effective as a leader since the feedback session? In response to this question, 78% of respondents felt that the leader had improved anywhere from a level of +1 to +2 or +3. Overall, the outcomes of the APEX coaching program were very encouraging. Leaders improved both in overall leadership effectiveness and their selected improvement areas, as perceived by those working with the leaders.
Read: Case Study: Guaranteed measurable results delivered for our FMCG client
Some useful lessons and pointers
The following are some key pointers and useful lessons learned from the APEX program that may enable any organization to more effectively implement an executive coaching program:
- A commitment of senior leadership
- Willingness and commitment of the participating leaders
- Offering choice and responsibility (of showing improvement) contributed to the success.
- Regular follow up with stakeholders increases leadership effectiveness.
Read: Your Executive Leadership Development – Sink, Swim or Setup for Success
Benefits from the highly successful APEX leadership development program
Agilent could provide the following benefits because of the APEX coaching program.
- Uniform leadership development process worldwide
- Uniform leadership coaching across geographies
- Fixed cost instead of often uncontrollable billable hours
- A lower negotiated rate that was uniformly accessible to any Agilent leader worldwide
- Saving of the leader’s time and travel costs – as the coach came to the leader
- Result guaranteed clause – no payment if the leader didn’t improve.
Some companies think they do not need a leadership development program. They simply fail to understand the detrimental effect of poor leadership on business performance.
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References: Book – Best Practices in Leadership Development and Organizational Change
By Louis Carter, David Ulrich, Marshall Goldsmith