Most leadership development programs are designed with good intentions: equip leaders with new tools, frameworks, and insights to help them lead more effectively. But despite billions spent globally each year, the impact often fizzles. Why?
Because most programs are built for comfort, not transformation.
Growth requires tension - just ask your muscles
Think about going to the gym. The process isn’t always enjoyable. You stress your body, push through resistance, and often feel sore the next day. But that tension is precisely what triggers growth. Without it, muscles don’t strengthen. Endurance doesn’t build. Change doesn’t happen.
Leadership development is no different. If the experience is too smooth, too passive, too theoretical - it doesn’t stick. Leaders may leave with good intentions, but without tension, those intentions rarely translate into action.
Antifragile leadership: thriving under pressure
Nassim Nicholas Taleb’s Antifragile offers a powerful lens here. He writes, “Wind extinguishes a candle and energizes fire.” Fragile systems break under stress. Resilient ones survive. But antifragile systems - and people - get stronger when exposed to volatility, challenge, and uncertainty. It’s not about avoiding tension - it’s about using it to grow - the right kind of pressure doesn’t break us; it builds us.
Another gem from the book: “Difficulty is what wakes up the genius.” In other words, leaders don’t become great by staying comfortable. They become great by stepping into the arena, facing complexity, and learning to adapt under pressure.
The research backs it up
Recent studies from Harvard Business Publishing and CIPD show that passive learning leads to poor retention and low transfer of skills. In fact, most leadership training sees only 10–30% retention after a few weeks, and even less consistent application on the job.
But when leaders are expected to apply what they’ve learned - especially in real-world, high-accountability contexts - retention and behavioural change increase dramatically. The tension of expectation, visibility, and responsibility drives deeper engagement.
Why most programs fall short
Most leadership development programs fail to fulfil their potential because they stop at the individual. In most programs, learning is seen as a personal journey. A leader attends a workshop, absorbs new tools, maybe reflects on their style, and returns to work with a few fresh insights. This comfortable approach creates low retention and application - they don’t build tension.
There are two things happening here:
- Tolerance levels
Even highly diligent leaders - those who genuinely want to apply what they’ve learned - will still operate within their personal comfort zone unless external tension is introduced. We all have different thresholds for discomfort, and without a deliberate stretch, we default to familiar patterns. Research confirms that leaders who intentionally seek discomfort - through stretch projects, public accountability, or unfamiliar challenges - report significantly higher growth, engagement, and meaning. Discomfort, when framed constructively, becomes a catalyst for deeper learning and behavioural change. - Mindset
There’s an unconscious default that often goes unchallenged: “I’m the leader - the training is for my growth.” This mindset, while understandable, reinforces a siloed approach to development. Studies show that mindsets are foundational to how leaders process and operate, yet few organisations actively address mindset in their leadership development efforts.
When leaders view development as a personal upgrade rather than a team-level investment, they miss the opportunity to cascade capability and culture.
By teaching, we learn - and tension enters the room!
This is where the Latin phrase Docendo discimus - “by teaching, we learn” - becomes more than a philosophy. It becomes a design principle.
When leaders are expected to teach what they’ve learned - to embed tools into their teams, to cascade frameworks, to model behaviours - a new tension is introduced. Suddenly, it’s not just about understanding the tool. It’s about owning it. Explaining it. Answering questions. Adapting it to real-world dynamics.
This changes everything.
Leaders pay closer attention. They ask better questions. They anticipate resistance. They reflect more deeply. Why? Because they know they’ll be responsible for passing it on.
Imagine Sue, who’s asked to represent her company at an organisational wellbeing conference. She’s told she’ll need to present back to her team on the key insights from the keynote speakers. That expectation alone changes how she listens. She’s no longer a passive attendee - she’s an active translator. She filters for relevance, clarity, and application. She’s learning to teach.
From personal leadership to team-level capability
For a team to become high-performing, it must evolve through distinct stages - from forming and norming to performing and sustaining. Where most teams falter is at the final hurdle: empowerment. This is the gateway to sustainable high performance.
When team members lack the tools to take on more leadership responsibility, empowerment won’t stick and the power remains concentrated in the hands of the formal leader. You might see fleeting glimpses of high performance - a great project, a moment of flow - but it won’t last. Without the tools, the team stays reliant, waiting to be directed. There’s no shared leadership. No distributed ownership. No resilience.
To break through, teams need clarity of roles and access to tools. Research shows that shared leadership and empowering leadership are mutually reinforcing - when team members are equipped to lead in their own domains, formal leaders trust more, delegate more, and perform better. Empowerment isn’t just a nice-to-have; it’s the mechanism that unlocks collective capability.
Why InSync builds tension by design
At InSync Leadership, this isn’t just a philosophy - it’s baked into the design. Our programs expect leaders to teach what they learn. We don’t just upskill individuals - we equip them to embed tools, language, and behaviours into their teams. That’s the tension. That’s the ripple. And that’s why the learning sticks - and why performance, culture, and clarity improve long after the workshop ends.
Authored by Mark Tapsell - October 2025
Sources
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Taleb, N. N. (2012). Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder. Random House.
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Harvard Business Publishing Corporate Learning. (2020). The State of Leadership Development.
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CIPD. (2021). Learning and Skills at Work.
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Journal of Business and Psychology. (2019). Shared Leadership and Empowering Leadership: A Meta-Analytic Review.
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Gottfredson, R. K., & Reina, C. S. (2021). Exploring the Role of Mindsets in Leadership Development. Organizational Dynamics.
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ESMT Berlin & Psychological Science. (2022). The Role of Discomfort in Leadership Growth.