How to Measure Whether Your Leadership Development Is Working
An Annual Survey to Assess your Leadership Development System—and What to Do With the Results
Organizations often measure leadership development by looking at participation: how many leaders attended a workshop, completed a course, or participated in coaching.
Those measures tell you whether people are using development resources. They do not necessarily tell you whether your leadership development system is giving leaders what they need to get better.
One way to find out is simply to ask them.
The following 10-question survey is designed to be used annually, either on its own or as part of an existing employee survey. It assesses whether leaders have clarity on what they need to develop, whether the organization provides the learning, practice, application, feedback, and reflection needed to support that development, and whether leaders believe they are actually improving.
The Leadership Development System Health Check
Ask leaders to rate each statement on a five-point scale from Strongly Disagree to Strongly Agree.
I understand what good leadership looks like at my level in this organization.
I understand the leadership capabilities I most need to develop to be successful in my role.
I have access to focused learning that helps me develop the leadership capabilities I need.
I have opportunities to practice the leadership skills I am developing before I need to use them in important situations.
I have opportunities to apply the leadership skills I am developing in my actual work.
I receive feedback that helps me understand what is working and what I could do differently.
I have someone I can turn to when I need to reflect on a leadership challenge and decide what to do differently next time.
I have meaningful input into what I focus on for my leadership development.
My organization supports me in continuing to develop as a leader.
Over the past year, I have made meaningful progress in becoming a more effective leader.
Optional open-ended question:
What would make it easier for you to continue developing as a leader?
What Should You Do With the Results?
The goal is not to get ten perfect scores. It is to understand where your leadership development system is helping and where there are gaps.
Questions 1–2: Do Leaders Know What They Need to Develop?
If leaders do not understand what good leadership looks like or what they personally need to develop, adding more training probably will not solve the problem.
If Question 1 is low: First confirm that leadership expectations are clear, easy to find, and appropriate by level. If they are, focus on reinforcing them through existing forums such as town halls, manager meetings, and performance conversations.
If Question 2 is low: Address this manager by manager. Managers should be helping each leader identify the capability or behavior they most need to develop, explain why it matters, and connect it to opportunities to improve. Track results year over year; if the same manager consistently receives low scores, this should shift from a development opportunity to a performance-management conversation about their effectiveness as a people leader.
Questions 3–7: Does Your Leadership Development System Give Them What They Need?
These questions assess the core elements of the leadership development system: focused learning, opportunities to practice, intentional application, feedback, and reflection.
If Questions 3–7 are low, look for where the system is breaking down rather than adding more development broadly. Compare the five scores, identify the one or two weakest elements, and focus improvement there. Then, talk with leaders to understand whether the issue is availability, awareness, accessibility, quality, or how the resource is being used. Track the results year over year to see whether the changes are working.
Questions 8–9: Have You Created the Right Environment for Development?
Organizations have an important role in leadership development, but leaders need ownership as well.
If organizational support scores highly but leader ownership does not, development may be too prescribed. Consider giving leaders more choice in what they develop and how they access support.
If both scores are low, the issue is broader. Leaders may not see development as something the organization prioritizes or gives them the time, resources, and support to pursue.
Also look for manager-level outliers. If one manager’s team consistently reports lower support for development than the rest of the organization, address that directly through coaching and clear expectations for people leadership. If the pattern continues year over year without improvement, it should become a performance-management conversation.
Question 10: Is It Actually Resulting in Development?
Question 10 is the outcome measure. Use it alongside Questions 1–9 to understand whether the development environment is translating into meaningful progress.
If Question 10 is low, look back across Questions 1–9 and identify where the biggest gaps are. If the system scores well but leaders still do not feel they are improving, dig deeper through interviews or focus groups to understand what is preventing development from turning into behavior change.
Measure, Improve, Repeat
The goal of this survey is simple: understand whether your leadership development system is giving leaders what they need to get better. Use the results to identify gaps, take targeted action, and track progress year over year.
If the results show gaps in the system itself, review the five elements every leadership development system should include. If the resources are there but development isn't consistently making its way into the work, look at how development is built into your organization's existing mechanisms.
Over time, the goal is to move from simply offering leadership development to continuously improving the system behind it.