A Study On The Effectiveness Of Enterprise Leadership Development

Leadership development has become a common choice for all enterprises to seek growth in the complicated and ever-changing internal and external environments. During the leadership development process, effectiveness is a core issue of common concern to enterprises. To this end, this study aims to explore the effectiveness of enterprise leadership development in three sections:the mechanism through which leadership development influences enterprise performance, enterprise leadership development system, and leadership development program design and implementation.Concerning the influence mechanism, this study builds a framework that demonstrates the relationship between leadership development and enterprise performance and proposes hypotheses based on the analysis of related theoretical research. By referring to the existing research results, the author designed a preliminary questionnaire and analyzed its reliability and validity through81valid samples, thereby finalizing the questionnaire. The finalized questionnaire was sent to enterprises in China and statistics about233valid samples were collected for analysis to prove the hypotheses proposed. By analyzing the survey results, the author has reached the following conclusions:Leadership development has no obvious influence on the financial or non-financial performance of the enterprises. None of the leadership development dimensions, including human capital preparation of individuals, social capital increase among entities, and organizational capital development in an organizational context, has obvious influence on the financial or non-financial performance of the enterprises. Enterprise leadership development has positive influence on organizational leadership, strategy development and execution, and corporate culture adaptation and assimilation, and shapes transformational leadership through organizational leadership. Indirect influence on enterprise performance is generated by enterprise leadership development through organizational leadership, strategy development and execution and corporate culture adaptation and assimilation. Enterprise leadership development should align with the strategy development and execution and corporate culture adaptation and assimilation.Regarding enterprise leadership development system, the study lists the key elements shall be involved in an enterprise leadership development system, including leadership needs and gaps, leadership development strategies, leadership development framework and solution, and leadership development support system. On the foundation of the aforesaid theoretical analysis, the author proposes the hypotheses on the systematic leadership development for enterprises and proves these hypotheses through statistical analysis of233valid samples from enterprises. The results show that leadership development programs have no obvious influence on leadership development or organizational leadership. The positive influence of leadership development programs on organizational leadership is less than that of human capital preparation of individuals or leadership development. In addition, influence of each dimension of leadership development on organizational leadership is smaller than that of leadership development. Besides, the leadership development support system has positive influence on leadership development. All the analyses lead to the following conclusions:1) The framework and system of enterprise leadership development shall cover all leadership development dimensions instead of one dimension only.2) Human capital preparation of individuals shall be closely related to and systematically aligned with activities of human resource management functions rather than only focusing on leadership development programs.3) The basis for effective enterprise leadership development is establishment of organizations, processes, capabilities, and IT platforms that support leadership development. To sum up, these analyses all highlight the importance of systematic enterprise leadership development activities. That is to say, effective enterprise leadership development requires a system that integrates all relevant elements. Enterprise leadership development practices shall cover all these elements and be implemented in a systematic manner. In terms of enterprise leadership development program design and implementation, this study employs a case study method to prove the proposed hypotheses. Specifically, the author observed the leadership development practices of junior-level R&D managers of an enterprise for about five years and analyzed second-hand data as well as articles on six leadership development cases of enterprises in Europe and the United States. According to the research results:1) An effective leadership development program should be aimed at social capital increase among entities and organizational capital development in an organizational context in addition to human capital preparation of individuals, so that the program focuses more on organizations rather than individual development and supports the strategy execution of the enterprise.2) To ensure optimal results with limited investment, enterprises tend to be cautious in investing in leadership development programs and only focus on key groups responsible for strategy execution. Even for these people, development interventions are only conducted during their key work stages.3) During content selection for leadership development programs, enterprises should stress the expectation and requirements for key roles in strategy execution and key capabilities required for role realization.4) In terms of development method selection, an effective leadership development program comprehensively employs multiple methods that enable participants to acquire direct experience and is well integrated with real work scenarios.5) During the implementation of leadership development programs, the participants should be responsible for leadership improvement, set their own goals, and develop and implement the plans, while the planned interventional activities of enterprises only provide support and assistance.To wrap up, the "the mechanism through which leadership development influences enterprise performance" section theoretically analyzes how leadership development influences enterprise performance, while the "enterprise leadership development system building" and "effective methods to design and implement a leadership development program" sections answer this what kind of leadership development can influence enterprise performance. In addition, the "enterprise leadership development system building" section covers all elements and specific implementation strategy for each element of effective enterprise leadership development from a macro perspective, whereas the "design and implementation of leadership development programs for enterprises" section lists effective ways to set goals, determine target audience, select content, and employ methods for an effective enterprise leadership development program from a micro perspective.