"Good managers know the business needs; great leaders know the business needs and what their people need — and avoid compromising on one in order to achieve the other."
—John Philbin, Program Faculty Director

What do all of your business goals have in common? They need the right workforce to succeed. In this program, you learn the critical role of effective talent management and team leadership in addressing and overcoming your business challenges.

Leveraging insights into human behavior and data-driven frameworks, you'll gain a holistic view of talent management essentials: people literacy, team structure and dynamics, growth planning, and your individual role as a leader. Within each area, you’ll use a system to uncover your organization’s unique strengths and weaknesses and create targeted action plans.

You’ll emerge with the ability to align your business needs with what your people need, giving your organization a competitive edge and fostering a thriving workforce.

By attending, you will...

• Develop leadership skills to align business strategy with people strategy, ensuring sustainable organizational success.
• Master the fundamentals of talent management and leverage behavioral insights to attract, retain, and cultivate a high-performance culture.
• Apply frameworks to enhance team dynamics, improve performance, and foster psychological safety.
• Strengthen team alignment and navigate cross-cultural dynamics
• Gain personal leadership strategies, including personalized action planning, for continuous growth.

A High-Impact Learning Format

This program incorporates two live online sessions with program faculty as well as self-paced learning. You’ll experience a blend of classroom sessions, group discussions, a case study, and assessments. Each module builds on the last, ensuring an impactful learning experience that makes you confident in your new skills and ready to drive change.

Customized Insights and Action Plans

Participants will gain access to Spectacular Team Assessment, a proprietary survey designed by John Philbin, as an integral part of this program. This assessment provides leaders with anonymized and aggregated insights into team dynamics across the cohort.

You'll also gain personalized insights and plans through:

• A proprietary People Literacy® framework that offers crucial insight into common business challenges.
• Talent assessment that will yield clear snapshots of where your company is currently, and provide a detailed roadmap for future actions.
• Talent risk assessment that will assess the state of your succession planning and identify potential risks to your company’s performance due to talent gaps.
• Personality assessment to understand your core behavioral tendencies and build better teams.
• Tools to help you learn rapidly from your own experiences.

Live-Online Sessions

This program incorporates two live-online sessions with program faculty. 

• December 2024 cohort: Live online sessions take place on December 10 and January 14 at 8:30 a.m. CST.

Language

This program is currently offered in English. All live-online sessions and simulation experiences are delivered in English.

Program duration

Six weeks, 5–6 hours per week

This program is ideal for mid- to senior-level leaders from any functional area who are key in managing talent and aligning their teams with the organization’s broader vision.

We recommend a minimum of seven years of professional experience, with a focus on identifying and nurturing top performers, driving employee engagement, and fostering people and culture initiatives.

This program is suitable for professionals across various industries and geographies, offering a globally relevant leadership experience.

Strategic Leadership and People Literacy

• Aligning business strategy and people strategy
• People Literacy®: Solving business challenges by understanding human behavior
• Making a strong talent management practice the responsibility of all leaders

Fundamentals of Talent Management

• Defining talent management: key deliverables for leaders
• '9 Box' and the alternative talent review 
• Assess the state of your succession planning
• Identify risks to your company’s performance due to talent gaps

Advanced Talent Management and Integration

• Building people development plans using principles of People Literacy
• Team/department talent action planning
• Integrating your talent strategy with business and people strategy
• Ensuring top performers are developing on the right track
• Evaluating workforce tradeoffs when organizations change and innovate

Team Dynamics and Psychological Safety

• How style and temperament affect team dynamics, cohesiveness, and performance
• The importance of psychological safety
• Building trust and avoiding derailers

Team Alignment and Cross-Cultural Dynamics

• Getting your team aligned, performing, and agile
• Cross-cultural considerations
• Courage, Conflict, and Challenge

Leadership and Personal Talent Management

• Balancing self-empathy and high standards
• Strategies for continuous growth as a leader
• Personal action planning