I have been writing about why leadership development is broken for 14 years. The workforce is more burned out now than when I started.
I am not immune to the challenges we are all facing and I feel like I am drowning in a wave of exhaustion. When we feel exhausted our brain does what it was designed to do, find energy conserving shortcuts.
My hope and optimism are lower than they have been for a while and I don’t think I am alone in feeling this. I was looking back at articles I wrote going back 14 years. Writing about why engagement surveys are not worth doing, why psychological safety is key, the problems with current approaches to wellbeing and leadership development. I remember thinking look at all the evidence we have that shows what leaders and organisations should be doing. I was confident things were going to change.
I saw our students in our Advanced Diploma of Neuroscience of Leadership so enthusiastic about how learning about their brain fundamentally changed how they managed themselves and their teams. I was full of optimism. I didn’t predict that we would be doing the same old same old.
My mission is to change the world one brain at a time. What I see is a world that is not getting better. Our workforce is running on empty and burnout is the worst I have ever seen it.
I have been running our Advanced Diploma of Neuroscience of Leadership for 14 years. Right now people are too exhausted to even think about studying the very thing that could help them. Employers don’t see value in paying for people to do the program when they already have an in-house leadership development program.
If these leadership programs are any good, why would their leaders be looking elsewhere?
I am really worried but I am not ready to give up hope just yet. Tell me I am not alone in this.
