Despite billions spent each year, leadership programs alone rarely deliver the sustained change organisations need. They spark insight, but too often the spark fades when leaders return to unchanged contexts and daily pressures. What organisations really need is a leadership development system (LDS): a connected, adaptive infrastructure that makes leadership development part of how the organisation operates day-to-day.

This article introduces the LDS Wheel, a model for building such a system. It draws on the latest research (Avby et al., 2025; Day & Dannhäuser, 2024; Fabisch et al., 2024, 2025; Geerts, 2024) and more than 20 years of practice. The Wheel highlights five core dimensions - Adaptability, Coherence, Scope, Integration, and Continuity - linked through a hub of interconnection and reinforced by senior leader sponsorship and evaluation at its rim. Like any system, it works best when the parts strengthen one another.

*The LDS Wheel: What Makes an Effective Leadership Development System*

Why leadership programs aren’t enough

Programs have their place. They create moments of learning, shared language, and energy for change. But even the best-designed program can’t carry the weight of transformation alone. As Day and Dannhäuser (2024, p. 3) put it: “Sending a changed person back into an unchanged system is often an exercise in futility.”

The knowing–doing gap persists because traditional programs are events, not systems, and it is systems that build habits. Programs inspire awareness, but without reinforcement and alignment, old ways quickly reassert themselves (Ahmadi & Vogel, 2023). If leadership development is not designed as a system, it stalls at inspiration - leaving strategy underpowered and execution inconsistent.

What is a leadership development system?

A leadership development system (LDS) is more than a collection of programs. Fabisch et al. (2025) define an LDS as “all deliberately chosen practices—interventions, activities, methods, structures, and arrangements—through which people engage to enhance leadership capacity and advance organisational objectives, covering both individual and collective aspects of leadership.”

This definition highlights two critical shifts: from isolated initiatives to interconnected practices, and from individual leaders to organisation-wide leadership capacity. An effective LDS integrates interventions into the broader ecosystem of how an organisation functions, enabling development to reinforce strategy, culture, and performance.

The LDS Wheel

The LDS Wheel is a practical way of visualising a leadership development system. It consists of:

The hub: The point of interconnection where all parts link, influence, and strengthen one another.
The spokes: Five core dimensions that give structure and balance.
The rim: Two enablers that provide momentum and accountability.

Together, these elements provide a model for shifting leadership development from fragmented initiatives to a holistic, integrative approach.

The Spokes: Five Core Dimensions

Adaptability

Adaptability means keeping leadership development alive by listening, adapting, and evolving in response to changing needs.

An effective LDS doesn’t run on autopilot. It continually takes in signals from inside and outside the organisation - feedback from teams, shifts in markets or customer expectations, changes in regulation - and adjusts (Day & Dannhäuser, 2024).

For example, a bank responded to regulatory reform by integrating compliance leadership into coaching conversations. A retailer shifted its leadership focus from operational efficiency to flexibility during a rapid digital rollout, based on quarterly pulse surveys.

Adaptability also helps organisations balance the tensions that invariably arise in a system, such as stability versus change or individual versus collective focus, by treating them as “both/and” challenges to be navigated rather than problems to solve. In turn, this boosts organisational resilience and the ability to navigate challenges, sustain performance, and foster innovation (Fabisch et al., 2025).

Coherence

Coherence means aligning leadership development with the organisation’s true north - its purpose, values, and strategy - so efforts move forward in a unified way.

Without coherence, initiatives pull in different directions and dilute impact (Avby et al., 2025; Geerts, 2024).

For instance, a healthcare provider consolidated performance reviews, talent assessments, and training into one framework anchored in its values of compassion and courage. A utility aligned its entire leadership curriculum to refreshed values and strategic priorities, making development a lever for delivering its business agenda. Coherence ensures leaders aren’t just learning generically, they are growing in ways that advance the organisation’s aspirations (Avby et al., 2025; Geerts, 2024).

Scope

Scope means developing leaders at all levels through more than just programs.

It recognises that leadership is exercised across the system, not just by those at the top. An effective LDS engages everyone expected to lead, from new supervisors to senior leaders, and addresses individual, team, and organisational levels (Day & Dannhäuser, 2024). For example, in a hospital, senior clinicians, ward managers, and shift leaders all worked to a shared leadership framework, creating consistency system-wide.

Scope also recognises that meaningful development involves blending multifaceted approaches and that programs are just one building block. Geerts (2024) proposes five different categories of development to leverage:

Individual: provides structure and focus, enhancing self-awareness, e.g., psychometrics, 360 feedback assessments, goal setting, and development planning.
Educational: content-based and often formal, e.g., lectures, webinars, case studies, and site visits.
Experiential: application-based, whether in practice or real contexts, e.g., role plays, simulations, projects, job-shadowing, and stretch assignments.
Relational: communication and dialogue-driven, e.g., mentoring, individual and peer coaching, networking, and communities of practice.
Resources: for self-directed learning and application guidance, e.g., readings, toolkits, how-to guides, and checklists.

The mix is what matters. Some activities complement or work best in combination, such as executive coaching following 360-degree feedback, underscoring the importance of designing an optimal package tailored to each identified need.

Integration

Integration means embedding leadership development into daily work and all people practices.

Leadership development sticks when it is part of how work gets done - built into everyday actions, decisions, and routines - not an add-on.

One organisation asked leaders to trial new delegation techniques in team meetings and reflect on outcomes the following week. Another built collaboration and coaching into cross-functional project rhythms. A third incorporated peer coaching into quarterly business reviews. These micro-learning moments create ongoing, in-the-flow development, whether in recurring meetings, regular forums, or planning cycles (Avby et al., 2025; Day & Dannhäuser, 2024).

Integration also means wiring leadership into people practices, including recruitment, onboarding, talent identification, engagement, reward and retention strategies, performance management and succession planning, as this reinforces that leadership matters and results are expected (Geerts, 2024).

Continuity

Continuity means sustaining leadership development over time so progress compounds into lasting impact.

Too many organisations chase the latest fads and trends, constantly rebranding or replacing programs, creating disruption and fatigue. In contrast, continuity is about sticking with core leadership frameworks, concepts, and practices and evolving them, rather than constantly reinventing the wheel (Fabisch et al., 2024).

One insurer has used the same leadership framework for more than a decade, refreshing the application but never the fundamentals. Another organisation runs peer-coaching circles for six months after each program to build on and reinforce learnings. These practices reposition leadership development as sustained and cumulative, not stop–start bursts of ‘one and done’ development.

The Rim: Critical Enablers

Sponsorship

Sponsorship means mobilising senior leaders to champion, resource, and role model leadership across the organisation.

Without visible support, leadership development risks being marginalised. Sponsorship isn’t just budget approvals - it is senior leaders showing up, setting expectations, and reinforcing behaviours in everyday conversations (Longenecker & Insch, 2018).

For example, CEOs who open every program, share personal development stories, and hold leaders accountable set the tone for the entire LDS. Conversely, a lack of sponsorship is consistently identified as the biggest barrier to applying learning (Geerts, 2024).

Senior leaders often underestimate the difference their involvement and commitment make; engaging them early and involving them in design builds ownership (Fabisch et al., 2025; Longenecker & Insch, 2018). Additional ways HR leaders can strengthen sponsorship include briefing execs on their role, embedding leadership goals into scorecards, and addressing capacity constraints that limit the time leaders have to spend on their development.

Evaluation

Evaluation means assessing outcomes to ensure leadership development delivers value and drives continuous improvement.

Too often, organisations measure attendance or satisfaction but not impact (Geerts, 2024). Robust evaluation tracks behavioural change, organisational outcomes, and ROI using both qualitative and quantitative data (Day & Dannhäuser, 2024). For example, one company built a leadership accountability index that combines 360-degree feedback, engagement results, and performance data. Leaders could see, and be held accountable for, the real outcomes of development.

Think of evaluation in three steps:

Measure: Behaviours, outcomes, and review against metrics the business already tracks.
Interpret: Make sense of the data against strategic goals.
Improve: Use insights to refine and strengthen the system.

This closes the loop, ensuring development remains relevant and adds value.

How HR Leaders Can Use the LDS Wheel

The LDS Wheel can be used in multiple ways:

Diagnostic: Audit your current leadership practices against the spokes and enablers of an effective LDS. Where is the system strong? Where does it wobble?
Design template: Use the Wheel to shape new initiatives, ensuring they connect across levels and with other practices and methods.
Engagement tool: Share the model with execs and other senior leaders to clarify their sponsorship role and secure buy-in.
Measurement map: Link evaluation measures to each element to demonstrate impact and ROI.
Planning guide: Prioritise one or two areas to strengthen over the next 12 months, building momentum step by step.

Conclusion

The LDS Wheel reframes leadership development as a system rather than a series of events. The hub connects the parts, its spokes provide balance, and its rim reinforces momentum. Together, they help organisations close the knowing–doing gap, enabling leaders to not just know what to do but to do it, consistently, collectively, and in service of organisational purpose.

The question for you isn’t whether you have leadership programs. It’s whether you have a leadership development system strong enough to make them stick. The LDS Wheel offers a blueprint for building out this system - and keeping it rolling.

Keen to better understand the state of your leadership development system or the best place to start?

Then get in touch, I’d love to help.

References

Ahmadi, A., & Vogel, B. (2023). Knowing but not enacting leadership: Navigating the leadership knowing-doing gap in leveraging leadership development. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 22(3), 507–530.

Avby, G., Bergmo-Prvulovic, I., Engström, A., & Kjellström, S. (2025). Coherence, continuity, and comprehensiveness in shaping leadership development systems in Swedish companies. Leadership. 1-25.

Day, D. V., & Dannhäuser, L. (2024). Reconsidering leadership development: From programs to developmental systems. Behavioral Sciences, 14, 548-561.

Fabisch, A., Kjellström, S., Ockander, M., & Avby, G. (2025). Nine principles for enhancing leadership development practices in organizations. International Journal of Training and Development, 1-13.

Fabisch, A., Kjellström, S., & Ockander, M. & Avby, G. (2024). Transformations towards an integrated leadership development system—A longitudinal study in a high-performing public organization. Leadership, 20(3), 105–124.

Geerts, J. M. (2024). Maximizing the impact and ROI of leadership development: A theory- and evidence-informed framework. Behavioural Sciences, 14, 955–1,002.

Longenecker, C., & Insch, G.S. (2018). Senior leaders’ strategic role in leadership development. Strategic HR Review, 17(3), 143–149.

The LDS Wheel: Building effective leadership development systems