Individual Leader Development

The focus of this chapter is squarely on the development of individuals as leaders, more commonly called leader development. Most claims of leadership development are really about the development of individual leaders. There is nothing wrong with this focus; however, it creates the erroneous expectation that developing leaders inherently develops leadership. It highlights a levels of analysis issue. Leadership involves an interpersonal application of relevant skills and mindsets and as such is a process that transcends a single leader to include others (e.g., followers). This chapter elaborates on the fallacy that developing leaders will develop leadership and the importance of using an appropriate developmental focus. Another relevant distinction discussed in this chapter is the difference between leadership training and leader development. It is not an either/or proposition in terms of leadership training and development. Both intervention forms can be useful, but they have different aims and rest on different assumptions. In terms of evaluation, one of the most fruitful methodologies to date has been that of charting and understanding personal trajectories of leadership. A non-technical overview of personal trajectory analyses will be provided, and how it has been applied to the study of leader development.