All of my adult life, I have learned best with people in small groups (8 to 12 individuals). In college it was study groups and in my professional life later, it was leadership learning groups. When I retired from my day job as a healthcare leader, I spent five years consulting, and was privileged to convene and facilitate two different senior leadership learning groups in my own community. After 50 years of learning, and also facilitating these kinds of learning groups, I can share the following observations. Some will be obvious and others not so obvious.

1. Individuals who participate in these groups learn and grow exponentially faster than those who don’t. This accelerated learning and development positions them extremely well in their organizations, and they very often fill roles of great responsibility and reward in their respective discipline and organization. The comparison between individuals who do participate in these groups, and those who don’t, isn’t even close.

2. Individuals who do participate in these groups are almost always more satisfied with their professional progress, their lives at work, and feel that they contribute well to the mission, vision, and values of their respective organizations.

3. Individuals who don’t participate in these kinds of groups often feel isolated, disadvantaged competitively, are far more likely to be dissatisfied with their lives at work, and feel that they are, in some way, denied the opportunity to contribute meaningfully to the mission, vision and values of their respective organizations.

4. Inside organizations that actively employ small leadership learning groups, participants develop a common language around the topic of leadership, they develop more personal relationships with each other, and they even actively help and coach each other in their respective professional journeys.

5. In addition to the value of increasing group knowledge on the topic of leadership, the value to the organization of the dynamic described in #4 above cannot be overstated. Individuals who may have only had a distant, over the phone or e-mail, working relationship before, now have a more personal relationship and departmental boundaries become much less of an obstacle to broader organizational progress.

6. Inside organizations that do not utilize small leadership learning groups, it is infinitely more difficult to achieve this level of large group comradery, common knowledge and partnering commitment.

7. The opportunity costs to organizations that do not employ small leadership learning groups are immense. In addition to the more obvious human development cost associated with failure to develop individual leadership skills, organizationally speaking, it is literally money left on the table.

8. For organizations that don’t employ small leadership learning groups, compared to those who do, everything is harder, everything takes longer, and there are more frequent failures. Individual leaders trying to solve problems alone, without the valuable learning content they might have accrued in a small leadership learning group, and without close colleague leaders to use as sounding boards and thought helpers, simply can’t execute programs and/or solve complex problems as effectively. Leaders in organizations like these are literally working alone together. 

How hard is it to implement small leadership learning groups in your organization?

It’s not hard. If your organization does not already have them, start with my book and group discussion guide. Select a convener or facilitator. It may be you! Establish a weekly, or even monthly, meeting time, cover one chapter each time the group meets using the group discussion guide to structure your discussion, and then, when you finish the book, keep it going. Choose another leadership development book, or a professional article on leadership from a source like the Harvard Business Review. You, and the rest of the group(s), will get better and better at this overtime, and your organization will be transformed. If you have questions about this, do feel free to contact me via the “Contact” form on this site.

All the best in your leadership journey!

Leadership MAXIMS is available for wholesale purchasing through Ingram Content Group.