Designed to look great on paper, rarely built to change behavior in practice. Jessica Lane, Director of Enablement and Communications at ScentAir, knows this better than most. She’s built something that works with a “small but mighty” L&D team, a limited budget, and a CEO who’s completely bought-in.
This is what she learned about building a leadership development program that actually works. The failure usually happens before a single participant logs in. Programs get built around what’s easy to measure: completion rates, satisfaction scores, hours of content consumed.
Not around what actually matters: are people leading differently? 1. **The first is building an event, not a system.** A two-day offsite, a keynote, a workshop. These feel impactful in the moment and produce almost nothing lasting. Leadership development requires sustained exposure, practice, reflection, and application over time. 2. **The second is choosing content people don’t respect**.
If a learner sits down to watch a training video and thinks “is this the best they have?” the program is already over. Content sets the tone for everything that follows. 3. **The third is fake executive sponsorship.**There is a version of executive support that lives on a slide deck and shows up nowhere else. That kind of support signals to the organization that the program is optional and the program fades. > _One of the biggest indicators of success is CEO endorsement.
If that doesn’t exist, success won’t happen.”_ > Jessica Lane, Director of Enablement & Communications, ScentAir The most common mistake when designing a leadership development program is jumping to curriculum before clearly defining the leadership gap you’re trying to close. Vague problems produce vague programs. _“A CEO’s job is to look ahead,”_ Brian Edwards, ScentAir’s CEO, said. We wanted to build the skills and capabilities of those up-and-coming leaders before they were put in the job.
Lots of companies talk about that. We actually did it.”_ **The ScentAir problem statement:** Not “we need leadership training” but **“we need a pipeline of leaders who are ready before the business requires them.**” That distinction shaped every subsequent design decision in ELEVATE Academy. Ask yourself: where could stronger leadership have the greatest impact on the business?
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