So how does your organization or team address generational dynamics from an awareness perspective? Are you at least having the conversation? Given how many employees find themselves at odds with colleagues of different generations, it’s worth thinking ahead. Here are some ways to make the conversation a productive one.

Have the Conversation

Believe it or not, many organizations resist holding generational training discussions in the first place. HR fears someone will be offended. Finance doesn’t want to pay for “unproductive” time. It’s important to understand what’s at stake. Generational mindsets and preferences about work and leadership are extremely unique to this era, especially given the technology advances of the last few decades. Baby Boomers will continue to retire en masse. Millennials have now become the largest generational segment in the workforce and are starting to creep into senior leadership roles. (Actually in these cases it’s more of a dash). At any rate, they have significant influence. It’s a great risk to put this conversation off.

Represent & Involve Each Generation

When comparing and contrasting generational themes, don’t leave anyone out. Better yet, solicit perspectives from each. Share the floor. Generate quality interactions. Make the goal better understanding and collaboration. Don’t let one group lecture the other. Do look for ways to build stronger connections.

Bring Out the Best

Are Millennials entitled? Are Baby Boomers out of touch? If that’s the extent of the conversation, be prepared for damage control. Focus on the good. Each generation has an incredible list of traits, perspectives and preferences to contribute. No one likes a lecture. Every segment is important.

Make it Fun

If you can’t find the humor in generational differences, you’re doing it wrong! Most diversity topics are off-limits for poking fun. This one is a little different. Do it tastefully, but give it a try. Each generation has its share of quirks. If you’re nervous, try a video to get the conversation (and mood) going. (This is one I’ve used before).

Keep it Up

Once you’ve held your first event, don’t call it quits. Keep the conversation and the momentum going. Ask for input from your team. Implement some of their ideas. Be willing to adjust your style at times and ask the same of them.

At the end of the day, the team with the best talent wins. If your organization can’t attract and retain the top talent from each generation, you’ll be at a sharp competitive disadvantage. Invest the time and planning now to hold productive, meaningful and engaging generational discussions. Everyone will be better for it.

Nathan Magnuson is a leadership consultant, coach, trainer and thought leader.  Receive his ebook Trusted Leadership Advisor by subscribing to his website or   follow him on Twitter.

Regardless, if you are going to invest in a leadership event, it’s an opportunity for excellence – whether you are an executive, manager or training expert. Don’t settle for mediocrity. Just having an event doesn’t guarantee success. Incorporate these best practices.

Identify a Real Need

Investing in a leadership event shouldn’t happen on a whim. It shouldn’t happen when the boss runs into a vendor at an event or thumbs through a bestseller in the airport. But whether it’s part of a strategic initiative or more opportunistic, a leadership event should focus on a real-life organizational need. That means there should be some sort of assessment or consultation beforehand. Identify the greatest opportunities in the organization and align the event accordingly. Don’t just focus on a topic of interest. Ask: “What do we want people to do differently as a result of the event?” Do as Stephen Covey says: put first things first.

Give Advance Notice

Events are expensive, especially if you are paying an outside trainer. So don’t wait until the event to let people know what’s coming. Make announcements, distribute pre-read materials and exercises, ask people to come with questions and issues. Prime the pump, so to speak, so your people will come to the event prepared to get the most from it.

Enlist Executive Support

Lack of executive support is a big reason why leadership development initiatives fail. But don’t just get their buy-in, involve them. Ask them to send the communication (drafted by you, of course), deliver the opening remarks or otherwise cast a vision for the leadership imperative. This sends the message that the topic is important. It’ll be a lot harder to build commitment on your own. Just remember that in order for this to work, you’ll need to spend extra time up front consulting the powers that be and including their ideas in the final product.

Make it Interactive

One of the central themes in adult learning theory is that learning events are most effective when they are collaborative. That doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be an instructional component. But make extra effort to include opportunities for learners to discuss the ideas (and practical applications) together. This takes more work, but it’s absolutely crucial. Don’t just rely on a fancy presentation to do the trick. If you are working with outside trainers, push them hard in this regard.

Reinforce the Key Points

When it comes to a leadership event, what happens in the room should definitely not stay there. There needs to be follow-up which you’ll need to prepare in advance. Create some reinforcement activities and think how best to involve the participants in future conversations to share how they’ve applied what they’ve learned. Find a natural place for these discussions to occur (e.g. weekly staff meetings) or else create one temporarily.

Leadership events are a big deal. They shouldn’t be taken lightly. So many come and go without leaving a mark. Your careful involvement up front can be a difference-maker.

Nathan Magnuson is a leadership consultant, coach, trainer and thought leader.  Receive his new ebook Trusted Leadership Advisor by subscribing to his website  or follow him on Twitter.

I’ve been privileged to help develop several leadership development programs (LDPs) in my career and I can tell you no two are identical for the simple fact that people and organizations are inherently unique – different cultures, different missions, different situations. While I don’t believe there is a perfect approach to building an LDP, there are definitely pitfalls. If your organization has one – or is thinking of investing in one – don’t fall short for one of the following reasons.

It’s Not Inspired

Most people say leadership is important, but when it comes to building an LDP, a deep-seeded belief in the power and potential of a leadership growth process is a must. This sounds obvious, but I’ve encountered enough executives and talent professionals who simply go through the motions. Unless someone somewhere has the heart for leadership – and the drive to build the infrastructure – your LDP will just become another project. “Belief in the cause” can’t be outsourced.

No Organizational Leadership Vision

As stated, your organization is unique. Because of this, you must have your own leadership vision. A leader on a battlefield will look different than a leader in the classroom. Your LDP needs to reflect those differences. I encourage each organization to kick off their LDP with a common theme: “What It Means to Be a [your organization’s name] Leader” – and go from there.

Executives Aren’t Involved

Some executives don’t place a high value on investing in leadership development. Others do, but fail to find ways to be involved. Both are big mistakes. Without an executive presence at some level, an LDP can have the feel (and support) of an overlooked side project.

Supervisors Can’t Lead

If you want to absolutely kill the momentum of an LDP interaction, cast a leadership vision for a group and then send them back to supervisors who can’t lead. The whole thing unravels before it begins. That’s one reason it’s important to start developing the leaders at the top of an organization first.

Inaccurate (or no) Needs Assessment

What ought to be in your LDP? Unless you’ve taken the pulse of your organization, you’ll likely miss out. What are your people’s main responsibilities? Where are they failing? What is changing in the environment? An off-the-shelf leadership solution may address some of these issues, but it will miss the unique needs of the organization.

Utilize Single Delivery Method

Some LDPs use a majority of computer-based training (CBT). Others exclusively use facilitators (instructor-led training – or ILT). Still others may revolve around an decentralized model (such as a mentoring program). The problem with a single approach is that people learn differently. It’s been said that it takes seven different delivery methods to get a message across. Don’t just rely on one approach, go for a variety.

No Reinforcement

How often have you attended a great event, generated a host of ideas, but then returned to work with a notebook that just collected dust? This is a common LDP challenge – and it’s completely avoidable. Pre-plan to reinforce key learnings through follow-up.

“One-Stop-Shop” Approach

Who is “in charge” of leadership in your organization? It shouldn’t be one group. Your HR or talent development team may be responsible for building the infrastructure and managing the projects, but they should never be the sole source of development. Each participant needs access to a community invested in his or her growth – supervisors, mentors, peers, local HR representatives, executive sponsors, etc.

Learning Outcomes Not Tied to Business Results

Feeling confident in the quality of your LDP is nice, but ultimately it’s not enough to justify the investment. Building an LDP should be a business decision preceded by a business case. Unfortunately, business results from LDPs are often tricky to quantify. Regardless, your LDP should have stated goals with specific success indicators that are measurable, such as higher bench strength, higher engagement scores, lower attrition, etc.

Building an LDP is a noble undertaking, but like most things in life, it can sometimes be harder than it looks. Don’t let that stop you. No LDP is perfect. One mark of high performing organizations is they bet on leadership. The important thing is to start – and adjust from there.

Nathan Magnuson is a leadership consultant, coach, trainer and thought leader.  Receive his new ebook Trusted Leadership Advisor by subscribing to his website  or follow him on Twitter.

I distinctly remember two candidates. Both had essentially the same qualifications. Both were young men. One was clearly relaxed, comfortable, social with the other candidates and didn’t appeared to be worried about the outcome. The other was very focused, prepared, asked pointed questions of the interviewers and appeared to take the opportunity very seriously.

My recommendation was to select the second young man. I think I scored the first as just so-so. Both were hired. It was evident from the get-go that the first was a solid fit. He worked well with his team, had high energy, was adaptable and delivered solid results. The second (my favorite candidate) had a deer-in-the-headlights look from day one. He was a poor fit and didn’t last long.

How could I have been so wrong?

The problem wasn’t with the candidates or the process. It was with me. I let my unknown biases creep into the interview process and prevent my judgment from remaining objective.

If you’re in a position where you need to hire someone, consider these common interview biases (not a comprehensive list) and hopefully you’ll avoid the same mistakes I made.

Similar-to-Me

This common bias gives preference to a candidate with similar qualities as the interviewer. I just recently saw a razor commercial that featured a candidate with a shaved head receiving preference in to interview with a bald hiring manager. That’s a classic case. In my situation, I assumed that just because one candidate was more intense than the rest (like I can tend to be), he was more qualified. In many cases, it isn’t true.

Halo Effect (or Horn Effect)

This bias takes place when an interviewer rates a candidate highly based on a single characteristic or performance outcome (or poorly with the Horn Effect). In actuality, a single instance is a poor measure of overall ability. (This holds true for performance evaluations as well).

Contrast

This bias takes place when an interviewer compares all candidates to each other – or to a single candidate – instead of to the role requirements. I made this mistake by comparing the two candidates in my story with each other instead of with the requirements of the role. Instead, compare candidates to the requirements and then see who comes out on top.

Nonverbal

This bias places extra emphasis on body language. Body language is important. It may well be a deciding factor between two equally qualified candidates. But body language alone doesn’t determine whether a candidate meets the requirements of a role.

Negative (or Positive) Emphasis

This bias takes place when an interviewer allows a small amount of negative information to outweigh positive information (or for Positive Emphasis – allows positive information to outweigh significant negative information).

Question Inconsistency

Question inconsistency is just that – asking different questions to each candidate. That’s why it is important to use an interview guide, or to at least record your questions so you can ask the same to each person.

Recency

With this bias, the interviewer recalls the most recently interviewed candidates the most clearly, and therefore rates them higher. This is why it’s so important to document your notes immediately after an interview takes place.

Knowledge-of-Predictor

This bias occurs when an interviewer is aware that a candidate scored high (or low) on an assessment test for the role in question. Assessment tests have their place, but an interviewer shouldn’t see the assessment results until after the interview (if possible) in order to stay objective.

This isn’t the entire list. There are plenty more: central tendency, cultural noise, leniency and others. But it’s enough to start with. Bias hurts, as in my story. And in virtually every case, it’s much easier to hire right than to correct a hiring mistake.

Have you let one of these biases impact a hiring decision? How did it turn out?

Nathan Magnuson is a leadership consultant, coach, trainer and thought leader.  Receive his ebook Trusted Leadership Advisor by subscribing to his website or   follow him on Twitter.

If you spend much time on social networks, you’ve probably even seen personality quizzes that blend with pop culture. Which Lord of the Rings character are you? Or Disney character. Or past U.S. president. Personality assessments are definitely trending right now.

Now before you get the idea I’m about to start hating on personality assessments altogether, I should mention first off that I’ve taken several myself and helped administer them in professional settings as well. Some of the assessments I’ve worked with are Myers-Briggs (probably the most popular), DiSC (my favorite), and FIRO Business and I’m familiar with several others. I’ve also worked with strengths assessments and 360 degree assessments.

Clearly, there are many benefits to personality assessments, so let’s start there.

What I Like About Personality Assessments

John Maxwell famously stated in his book The 15 Invaluable Laws of Growth that “you’ve got to know yourself to grow yourself.”

It’s surprising how deeply some people study other leaders while completely ignoring themselves. Then they get frustrated because they can’t attain the same results.

On the other hand, there are plenty of leaders who expect that the only way to be successful is for their followers to copy their methods. That usually frustrates everyone.

The truth is that we’re all different. Personality assessments benefit us by helping to show us how we’re unique. The implications for how extroverts interact and gain energy are a lot different from introverts. People with dominant personalities usually respond differently to challenges than conscientious personalities. And the list goes on and on. Add all the ratings together and you have a profile. Depending on the assessment, profiles may have additional descriptions based on common traits and themes.

No personality assessment is 100% accurate, but many can be extremely accurate. The next time you take one, make sure to review the information and validate the results. You may ask for the input of other people who know you closely or enlist a coach to help you interpret the results. Look for areas where you can further your development. Personality assessments should be useful as well as insightful – but it’s up to you to take the next steps.

If you’ve never taken a personality assessment before, I’d recommend you take the DiSC Classic Profile either online or in print.

The Thing I Hate About Personality Assessments

And now for the moment of truth. What is it I hate about personality assessments?

Personality assessments can make it easy to excuse bad behavior.

That’s it. Once the “scientific data” comes in, it’s easy to justify why would shouldn’t have to act a certain way or do certain jobs simply because it’s not “the way we are.” Here are some examples:

• I shouldn’t have to be friendly to every new person I meet all the time.
• I shouldn’t need to make a decision so quickly.
• I shouldn’t have to be so flexible. Or structured.
• I shouldn’t be expected to be so creative.
• I shouldn’t have to be the leader in this situation.

The reason I hate this is because I’ve caught myself thinking these kinds of thoughts at times – and other people too.

Imagine having your team take an assessment together and then everyone using the results to justify poor performance instead of high performance. When non-ideal jobs come up, it’s a chance to be flexible. When responsibilities come up that don’t come naturally, it’s a chance to build some compensatory skills.

At the end of the day, personality assessments should be developmental. It’s up to us to use the results constructively, instead of destructively.

How do you feel about personality assessments?

Nathan Magnuson is a leadership consultant, coach, trainer and thought leader.  Receive his new ebook Trusted Leadership Advisor by subscribing to his website  or follow him on Twitter.

Just like in medicine, the last thing a change practitioner should do is prescribe before diagnosing. You don’t want to “fix” the wrong problem. That usually just makes things worse and hurts your credibility.

So how do you diagnose an organization?

Don’t worry, it’s not as complicated as you might think. While survey and data analysis have their place, the method I like to start with is the interview. I’ll identify the key leaders who make the management decisions (VPs, directors, managers, etc). Never just one, but several. Then I’ll schedule time with them to get their input.

The First Three Questions

As I’ve mentioned before, I have a set of three questions I always ask to leaders I meet with, whether I’m doing a diagnostic or not. It allows me to cut straight to the chase of how their organization is doing without being overly intrusive. Here they are:

• What excites you about your organization?
• What would you like to get to next if you could?
• What concerns do you have about your organization right now?

With these short questions, I’m able to quickly capture an overview of the passion, strategy and fear of the leader in a relatively pressure-free way. But if I will be responsible for proposing and/or delivering a solution, I don’t stop there.

In graduate school, I read the book How to OD…And Live to Tell About It by William Becker. In it is an organizational diagnostic I’ve come to really appreciate. Below is a sample of the most important questions from Becker that I use and you can use as well.

Culture

• What are people like and what seems to be important to them?
• What type of person succeeds here? Why?
• How are people professionally developed?

Strategy

• What is the organization’s mission?
• What are your key organizational goals?
• What do people perceive they are most rewarded and recognized for doing?
• What are the top three challenges facing your organization/industry now? Over the next 3-5 years?

Change History

• What are some of the recent (or current) change initiatives your organization has undergone on over the last few years?
• What was their purpose? What resulted and how has this impacted your organization today?
• What were some of the obstacles faced and how were they addressed?

Needs

• In your view, what is the most important thing your company needs to address?
• What do you want to take on right now? Why haven’t you?

Influence

• How is the executive team composed in your firm? What are they good at (as a team)?
• What seems to drive decisions here?

Preferences

• Are you looking for a pair of hands to tell them what to do, or an expert to tell you what is the problem and provide a solution, or are you looking for a collaborative effort where someone facilitates you and your stakeholder’s discovery of the problem and create solutions together?
• Is there anything else I should be aware of if I am to be helpful to your organization?

Once you’ve interviewed enough of the leaders to get an accurate assessment of the situation, you have will generally have the information you need to get started. Compile the results, highlight the major themes, and report them back to the leaders you interviewed. Include your recommendations for what needs to be done and how you propose to make it happen – along with their necessary involvement.

Congratulations, you’ve just completed step one – and what some consider the most important step – in the consulting process!

What other questions would you include? Keep in mind that most leaders don’t have time to answer all of your questions!

Nathan Magnuson is a leadership consultant, coach, trainer and thought leader.  Receive his new ebook Trusted Leadership Advisor by subscribing to his website  or follow him on Twitter.

Back in the 1970s, Gordon Training International developed a learning model called “The Four Stages of Competence,” which has also been linked to Abraham Maslow’s work. There’s something helpful about breaking an idea or a challenge down into smaller parts, and competence is no different. If we can understand which stage both we and our followers are in, we’ll be much more useful. Here are the Four Stages of Competence:

Unconscious Incompetence

In this stage, an individual simply doesn’t know what they don’t know. Picture a new college graduate, an entry-level employee, a newly promoted supervisor (sometimes) or a clueless new business owner. In these situations, individuals can often be high on drive but low on actual ability. In other cases, individuals may be unmotivated as well as clueless as to their level of competence.

The bottom line is that people in this stage cannot progress to the next without an awareness of their own deficit. Whether they experience a reality check on the job, receive input from a supervisor or come to a realization on their own (or any number of interventions), the recognition itself is the key to future growth.

Conscious Incompetence

In this stage, an individual recognizes that a gap in their level of competence exists. They realize they lack the skills, knowledge or ability they need to be successful. For many people, engagement and motivation can drop significantly when this happens. Think about it: how would you respond if you thought you were good at something only to find you weren’t? To bridge the gap, they can benefit immensely from resources, coaching and the elbow room to learn from their mistakes. The time it takes to develop to competence depends on many of these factors.

Conscious Competence

In this stage, an individual is aware that they have acquired knowledge, skills or ability. However, they must still concentrate focused effort to be successful. Tasks may need to be broken down into steps in order to attain mastery, which generally requires practice. Still, this is one of the most rewarding stages since it represents significant growth.

Unconscious Competence

In this stage, an individual has demonstrated a skill to the extent that it has become “second nature.” It takes far less effort and focus than it once did. They can multitask and not see a drop in performance. Provided the individual learned correctly, they can teach others to acquire the same skill. Although unconscious competence is the goal, one of the dangers is that people in this group can be tempted to forget the fundamentals.

We invariably occupy each of these stages across all the skills we possess (or need to possess). The trick is to discover which we belong to. As a leader, it’s even more important to be able to assess the competence of those who follow us so that we can know how to best develop them.

Can you think of a time you crossed all four stages?

Nathan Magnuson is a leadership consultant, coach, trainer and thought leader.  Receive his new ebook Trusted Leadership Advisor by subscribing to his website  or follow him on Twitter.

This may be how you feel about evaluation… unless you have a built-in evaluation plan. In that case, you’ll be ready to hand over the results of your training before management even asks for it.

So how do you evaluate learning programs? In this post, I’d like to summarize the Kirkpatrick Four Levels of Learning Evaluation.

Donald Kirkpatrick is the founder of training firm Kirkpatrick Partners and a past president of the American Society of Training & Development (ASTD). In 1954, Kirkpatrick developed what is now known as the Kirkpatrick Evaluation Model as part of his doctoral dissertation. The comprehensive guide is presented in his book Evaluation Training Programs: The Four Levels. Here are the four levels:

Level 1: Reaction

This level measures the initial reaction of training participants to the content and event. It focuses both on their thoughts and feelings. Were they actively engaged? Did it seem relevant to them? Did they get to participate in the learning process? The Level 1 evaluation is most easily conducted onsite at the conclusion of the learning event, or at least very soon afterward. A short form or survey is usually the easiest tool to use.

Level 2: Learning

This level measures the increase in knowledge or capability as it relates to the course’s content. The ultimate goal is for participants to learn the material, develop the necessary skills, believe it is worthwhile, and be both confident and committed to using what they’ve learned. Depending on the course subject, evaluating this level may be a bit tricky. To measure an increase, obviously there ought to be a pre-event and post-event assessment. One method is to have practical exercises at the conclusion of the training to measure learning. Another is to use a test or observe on the work site afterwards.

Level 3: Behavior

This level measures the application of the learning in the participants’ work roles over time. The crucial part of this level is that the course’s learning goals must to be supported by the organization’s infrastructure, processes & systems in order to provide the sustained motivation for application. In other words, it needs to be easy for the participants to practice what they’ve learned without interference, and there should be visible rewards. One way to measure this is to interview managers who have been encouraged to observe their teams’ behavior after the learning event has taken place. (This is one reason it’s so important to involve managers in the course development).

Level 4: Results

This level is the ultimate measure of learning effectiveness: improved business results, such as increased sales, decreased turnover, higher employee engagement, etc. The great thing about this level is that management already measures these business results. The important thing for you is to be able to link the training to the results it ought to affect. Next, identify the performance of the participants for the next time period. Then you’ll be able to report that, “the average training participant had a 30% sales increase in the year following the training” or “customer service satisfaction levels for participants were 20% higher than for non-participants.” The more you can measure results, the better a case you make for your learning program.

Learning evaluation can at times seem complicated but it can also be provide immense clarity. Don’t make it harder than it needs to be. If you aren’t currently doing any evaluation of your learning programs, simply pick one level and start with that. The feedback you get will let you know if you’re on the right track.

Which level do you focus on the most?

Nathan Magnuson is a leadership consultant, coach, trainer and thought leader.  Receive his new ebook Trusted Leadership Advisor by subscribing to his website  or follow him on Twitter.

Sitting in on an interview might have been awkward for that role, but since then I’ve participated in many job interviews, observed the process and helped identify skills needed for future job roles. Talent acquisition can get complicated sometimes, but I constantly find myself referring back to three simple questions my friend Brad once shared with me about how to determine if a candidate is a good fit for the team. I’d like to share them with you.

Would this person be a positive influence on my team? On my kids?

A person may have all the technical and leadership skills required to get a job done. But at the end of the day, we all become like the company we keep. If a person’s influence is less than positive, it will bring the entire team down. An extreme way to think about this is to consider if you’d feel comfortable having you children spend time around the individual. If that doesn’t seem like a good idea, perhaps you ought to reconsider offering the candidate a chance to significantly influence your employees.

What has this person done? Does it match their stated values?

Most positions require a resume as a part of the job application. It’s certainly important that the actual experiences matches what you find on the application. But it’s also important to demonstrate a values match. If a candidate says he is a very loyal employee but has held five jobs in the last two years, that should set off some alarm bells. Or perhaps he talks about how important customer service is but then complains about the customers of a previous company. Would you expect him to feel any differently about your customers?

What is this person’s motivation to be part of this team?

This is a pretty straight forward question. Why is the person applying? Does she want to be a part of the team or does she have her sights set beyond this particular role to another one? Will it be a resume builder or a developmental experience? Of course no one will (or should) stay in the same role for the rest of their career. But if this job is not the one the candidate wants, wouldn’t you want to know why she is applying to this one instead of to another one? Chances are, she will not be as invested as a person who truly wants to be there.

None of these questions ought to replace typical questions regarding competency. But skills being equal (or in some cases, not being so equal), isn’t it worth going the extra mile to find the “right person?”

What other criteria do you use to identify the right person for a new job?

Nathan Magnuson is a leadership consultant, coach, trainer and thought leader.  Receive his new ebook Trusted Leadership Advisor by subscribing to his website  or follow him on Twitter.

Following are six specific ways many organizations have traditionally thought about training – with a culture “shift” for each one.

Learning takes place during training events.

Shift: Learning takes place before, during and after training events – as well as on the job and after hours.

Gone are the days when training is simply viewed as a “vacation” from actual work. With attitudes like this, it’s no wonder management got so eager to cut training budgets. Make sure employees understand that they must complete pre-work assignments before arriving at the learning event so they are prepared to engage with the content as soon as the events begins. Have a follow-up plan. Even more importantly, help them understand the importance of learning through experiences on the job – as well as from external sources.

The instructor is the expert.

Shift: Everyone is an expert: facilitators, self and peers.

If the instructor is the only expert, the purpose of a learning event will be to simply download the information from the instructor to the participants. If everyone is an expert, the facilitator operates as more of a guide and participants learn from assessing their own experiences and from collaborating with the content and with others – both inside and outside of the event.

The organization is responsible for each person’s development.

Shift: Everyone is responsible for own their development and for sharing what they know with others. The organization is responsible for supporting development via the learning infrastructure.

If only the organization is ultimately responsible for the development of each employee, then employees will understandably take a passive role in the development process. On the other hand, if the organization plays a support role, each person must be a proactive participant in the process. The organization builds the system and the participants engage with the content, resources, and most importantly: each other (are you catching a trend for collaboration?).

Mistakes are unacceptable, so hide them.

Shift: Mistakes are unavoidable – so share and learn from both successes and failures. Encourage creative experimentation.

Some mistakes are truly unforgivable, especially if they involve safety, privacy, sensitive information or ethics. And yet they still occur. The worst response is to sweep them beneath the rug and pretend they never happened. This only ensures that the same mistakes will take place again in the future. Not only that, it damages an organization’s credibility with employees (and outside stakeholders) who know the mistakes happened. Many mistakes are not fatal. It takes guts to admit when we’re wrong, but it’s one of the most development-rich opportunities out there. Mistakes become examples of what not to do (again). Moreover, when there is freedom to fail, there is extra incentive to succeed. Truett Cathy once said, “Anything worth doing is worth doing wrong… until we can learn to do it right.” When it comes to admitting mistakes, leaders ought to lead the way and go first. And if you are going to fail, take risks and fail in a training environment first.

Grades come from learning assessments.

Shift: “Grades” come from feedback of self, peer, trainers, supervisor and business results.

The ultimate grades of any learning event come in the form of business results. It’s not enough to give a right answer – you have to perform the correct action on the job. But the real catch is that often there is no “right” answer. Many decisions are situation-specific and don’t net a result until further down the road. And let’s not discount the value of feedback. Oftentimes we have a decent assessment of our own level of understanding. “I’ve got this,” or “I definitely don’t get this!” Peers, training staff and supervisors help provide additional insight that we can take or leave. Take them.

A passing grade completes training (emphasis on passing).

Shift: Development is never “complete” (emphasis on continual growth, mastery and collaboration).

Learning is only “pass/fail” in the classroom but never in real life. For some technical training events, a certain level of quantitative proficiency must be attained. I don’t want someone operating on my who hasn’t passed extensive competency assessments! But the learning is never over. A training event is simply a stepping stone on the path to mastery. Also, the most complete learner is not the one who knows the most, but the one who shares the most with others.

Which of these shifts does your organization need the most? What additional learning shifts would you add?

Nathan Magnuson is a leadership consultant, coach, trainer and thought leader.  Receive his new ebook Trusted Leadership Advisor by subscribing to his website  or follow him on Twitter.