You see a lot of leadership posts on LinkedIn. They usually are some sort of info graphic or meme stating what feels to the reader as obvious characteristics of good leaders contrasting them with a ill perceived notions of a bad boss.

But the real world rarely get's fixed with an infographic. Memes might point out the obvious or funny but they don't force action. And contrasting 'leaders' with a 'boss' misses the mark.

In this article I'm going to try and share what I have found to be a practical way to create a leadership program in an organization. Something you can use in your organization. This isn't the "How to be a good leader" article. There are piles of books and information on that which are far more in depth.

Full disclosure. Building this isn't going to be snap your fingers easy. But nothing good ever is.

It should start from the top - but it doesn't have to

If I were to imagine the perfect program it would start from the CEO and spread from there. That level of buy-in and commitment is the greatest accelerator of any organizational effort. It brings to bear the means and attentiveness of others de facto. But it doesn't have to start there. A department or business lead can start within their own group. It's a tactic I used where I started and incubated in my team first and let the results spread and speak for themselves ultimately leading to company wide initiatives..

These sort of programs require some level of resourcing and the biggest resource that will be committed is time and attention. There will be other hard costs like books (I asked participants to buy there own and offered to pay them back if they felt the book sucked) and some training material. In today's virtual world travel is optional so meetings can be run remote but as will be discussed later some travel and entertainment costs might be in the works as well. But time is time. Its finite and they don't make more of it.

Cascade the program

 The program ultimately needs to hit all levels of your organization all the way to the front line. That's the real secret to unlocking these programs. Every level needs to be a part of it. And the bonus? It shows those individuals they are really part of the company and the company is invested in them. They get to grow. They will also hold their supervisors more accountable.

But no organization is going to have enough trainers (we'll call them leadership coaches) to lead this training especially at scale. You will have to train and grow your coaches first! Like a good pyramid scheme you're going to have your soon-to-be coaches go through the first sessions. They will then be tasked to lead following sessions as the pyramid expands.

You have to build the bench, set the flywheel in motion and just get that snow ball rolling.

Good candidates are your support department leads, VPs of operations, regionals etc. You must have their buy in to make the program work anyway. You'll be asking people in their org chart to devote time. They'll need to buy in as they ultimately will be the ones that make sure time gets allocated for this program. And everyone is already short on time with the day to day operations.

Now, some of you might be already raising your hand and saying wait…you want to have our VPs, Regionals etc., to take the time from their job to: 1. Learn this themselves and then 2. Teach this? Do you know how much we pay them?

Well consider this: People, especially those that run parts or an organization, must put their time in where they get the highest leverage from it. Everything else is just less important by definition.

I will offer another option for you, though. Go for the coalition of the willing first and make them the first set of coaches and fans of the program. You will have people in your organization that are motivated and into these things from the get go. The fact they volunteered instead of being volun-told will mean they are a sympathetic group and not a bad choice to work the kinks out in your presentation, study guides etc. 

Now, pick your language

This is a critical but often overlooked step. Your organization has to learn to speak the same language. Here is what I mean. Everyone will come to the table with their background and experience in play. Words and their associated context will have different meanings for each of them. This is true with even the basic "What does Leadership mean?" You'll need to set the base definitions of the words and concepts you are going to work with and expand from there. You can get nuanced about things when you know and agree what they mean.

But what's really cool is you'll get shortcuts to action once your team all knows the same concepts. If an issue popped up and there was a conflict with another department or they had a need, all I had to do was say "Looks like this is an opportunity where we can cover and move" and they could take it from there. No further explanation needed. But then you and I might not being speaking the same language right now so you might be wondering what the heck I'm talking about.

Which leads me to how you pick your language.

A good place to start is to pick a book. This will help you define your language and key concepts. Now there are literally thousands of books on leadership and some go back thousands of years. Some are abstract, some focus on specific items. As your read them you will see some consistent themes occur, some universal truths. But you have to build a foundation to start on. Many leadership books have companion books set for training. Also a plus if you don't want to craft your own.

 Those that know me know the book I recommend is Extreme Ownership, by Leif Babin and Jocko Willink. Why I like it is simple: it covers the bases and sets the groundwork for most all of the many facets of leadership and then lays into practical applications. For example, there is a chapter on "Believe" which explores the same concepts as in Simon Sinek's "Start with Why", a chapter on planning that pulls to "Wooden on Leadership" and so forth. You can branch and explore concepts in detail on a whim.

Now here is the downside with Extreme Ownership. You will have people in your audience that initially might not resonate to the idea of what the just perceive as a military themed book. It's that language issue we talked about earlier showing its head. Not everyone grows up playing with GI Joe. Heck, I've even had a participant say he refused to read it because his step dad was military and he "Hated that son of a …" - well, you get it. But for those that read it, their perspectives all changed as we went through the program.

But if you don't pick Extreme ownership that's ok! Pick a book and go to the next step.

Kick off the program and dive deep

Here's where the commitment begins and the rubber meets the road. The content and roll out of the program. Since books are broken up by chapters, you get a native way of segmenting the first part of your leadership program. (You can't just stop after one book) Call it their freshman year, phase 1 or whatever.

Take one chapter every and have participants read it in 2-3 weeks. If your book has 12 chapters your program will take 24 -36 or so weeks to complete. Some chapters are simpler than others so you'll be able to combine. But basically 1 chapter gives you 1 session.

You'll want to structure the session so you have a clear outcomes. Help guide and focus their reading and try to encourage thought as they read it. I called it a Participant Guide and provided it to them at the beginning of each session. This guide gave:

• A clear objective or outcome for the session.
• The required prework to the session to be discussed in a meeting (usually reading a chapter from the book)
• Optional information to study (chapters from other books or articles on the same concepts being discussed)
• Things or points to consider as they read that got them to relate the content to their world.

Then hold your session meeting for the participants. You'll need at least an hour and the size of the group should allow everyone in the group to participate. Be advised that groups larger than 16 can get unwieldy and leave participants out - especially those that like to hide in the background.

As a moderator of the session my goal was to get the participants to really discuss the information they had just absorbed. We'd start a recap of the content (as explained by the participants) and then explored. How did it pertain to what they were currently doing? Have they experienced those issues? How have they handled it? Who does it particularly well? And so on.

The fun comes when you see the breakthroughs or "aha" moments in the sessions. Dots connecting, concepts coming into focus and then action. 

Really expect something from the participants (besides them just showing up)

You can expect hurdles to be thrown your way.

• Everyone is busy. They have a full time job after all.
• Scheduling the meetings will be a nightmare. Owner calls, department calls, etc. all will be conflicting and everyone already has too many meetings. This is where commitment from up above helps along with scheduling in advance.
• Not everyone is a reader or wants to read. I've had people tell me the last time they read a book was in school. The good news is books are now audible so they can listen instead of read. Some people even find they like reading once again.
• Some teammates will refuse to read "after work". These were usually yellow flags for me as they alerted me to an individual that was working just to clock in and clock out. Typically their performance followed their attitude. Proceed as necessary.
• Some people will already know it all, unlike the rest of us who don't know nothin'. They'll wonder why they are even there - especially when they have to hire for all those openings on their team. But btw, these folks can become your biggest helper and success if you can navigate their ego in the right way.

But even with those hurdles you should expect a lot from your participants. Set the bar high.

First and foremost they need to be prepared for the sessions. They should expect to be called on to summarize a portion or thought from the chapter, to provide feedback.

One of the most valuable parts of the sessions we did was where we had participants step out of the book for a bit build and write out what their "Commander's Intent" was. I won't go exactly into what a "Commander's intent" is here, but what the exercise did was force them to write down and look hard at what their team, site or region was doing, articulate their goals or objectives, how it aligned with the broader objectives and deliver that to the team.

That made them actually stop and think about their part of the business in a formal way. It was eye opening and a great learning / teaching moment. One group which consisted of regionals managers, proved particularly enlightening as the peers could see first hand the difference in strategies and objectives. For some it became clear that they really didn't have any sort of intent. They were just winging it trying desperately to hold to their budgets without really understanding what the intent was. It triggered conversations with owners and exposed gaps and opportunities. 

Past the "Freshman Year" or "Phase 1"

With your first book under your belt you'll find that the group is speaking the same language and on par with each other in a lot of ways. But, the message needs to go out to the rest of the organization still! So spin off Phase 1 with your students now assuming the role of coach wherever possible. You learn the most when teaching as they say and they'll learn a ton paying it forward.

The Sophomore year or Phase 2 can now focus on another book or another aspect you want to explore. The format can remain the same but the importance is keeping up the cadence and keeping the discussion alive. The program roles on and grows or withers and dies. Your choice.

Within your groups you can create peer groups so help leaders solve leadership problems and work through issues as a group. "Hey I have an owner who I'm having this issue with" or "Can you help me approach this problem" It's great synergy.

By mindful that every new member or your organization, especially the senior leadership needs to be brought into the fold, otherwise the culture and concepts quickly drift. The new team members won't be on the same page, won't develop the same trust, honesty or forthrightness. You'll lose ground.

Measuring your investment

Let's face it. This is a big investment. You'll want to track and monitor the effectiveness. The trick here is that this won't necessarily show as a linear result. It tends to compound over time and show in ways you might not expect. But here are some signals you can use.

• Participation & Engagement: Completion rate of the reading and sessions, quality of discussion (are people showing up prepared?), and voluntary peer coaching that emerges.
• Behavioral Change: Track simple but powerful observations: Are leaders using the shared language? Are they owning problems instead of blaming? Are they giving clearer direction and better feedback? Use 360-degree feedback or simple pulse surveys before and 6–12 months after the program starts.
• People Outcomes: Employee engagement or satisfaction scores
• Voluntary turnover (especially regrettable turnover of high performers)
• Internal promotion rate and bench strength (how many roles are filled from within)

Look at the areas your leaders directly influence: business outcomes, customer satisfaction, operational efficiency, or just plain performance in the groups that have completed the program. Compare them against groups that haven't yet.

Don't overcomplicate it. Pick 3–5 metrics that matter most to your organization and review them every quarter. The real proof usually shows up in the stories: fewer escalations, faster decision-making, a tighter culture and people saying, "This is how we do things here now."

Wrapping Up

Building a leadership program isn't about flashy one-off training events or motivational posters. It's about creating a living, breathing system that aligns language, raises standards, and develops leaders at every level of your organization. Executive team down to the front lines.

The approach is straightforward but demanding:

• Secure commitment. You must commit and true success get commitment from the top,
• Select a foundational resource and create a shared language. A culture of leadership.
• Train your first group of coaches, run disciplined chapter-based sessions with real discussion and application, then cascade the program outward.
• Treat it as an ongoing flywheel rather than a one-time initiative. Phase 1 builds the base. Phase 2 and beyond keep the momentum alive through peer problem-solving, new book explorations, and continuous onboarding of new leaders.

Yes, it requires time, focus, and some discomfort. But the payoff is significant: higher accountability, better decision-making, stronger culture, and people who feel genuinely invested in by the company. Leaders who "get it" will naturally raise the bar for those around them, creating a virtuous cycle.

Start small if you must, but start.

Run the first sessions with your willing coalition, prove the value, and let the results do the talking. The organizations that consistently invest in developing their people this way don't just perform better—they become places where talented people want to stay and grow.

There is much more to cover on this but this is intended to be an article, not a book. Feel free to shoot me a message and I can share some of the content I've created here and I'm happy to chat.