By Marc Viebahn & Brandon James Mergard
Successful leaders develop themselves. Continuously. They use training, consulting, and coaching. New challenges demand new capabilities. Development never stands still. Until they reach top management. From that point on, the drive for personal development fades. The people with the greatest leverage in an organization have the least appetite for further growth. Think about that for a moment.
Why? On the surface, you might think: once you’re at the top, development is done. But look at the last six years. The demands on leaders have changed dramatically. The pace is relentless. If anything, the case for continuous development gets stronger the higher you climb.
Some top managers fear that formal development signals weakness. And yes, some people in the organization might see it that way. But that raises a different question: Are those really the people you want around? For most employees, a leader who actively develops sends a powerful signal. It shows the way forward.
Most companies lack effective processes for top management development. HR departments run leadership programs for middle management. The reviews are mixed at best. Formal programs at the top? Rare.
There is no shortage of coaches. The number has exploded in recent years. What’s missing are coaches who can operate at the top management level. Coaches who earn credibility. Coaches who combine coaching skills with a real understanding of business and the pressures of leading at the top.
The GOAT Analogy
How do other top performers handle this? Why do elite athletes still have coaches? Does Tiger Woods know nothing about golf? Did Michael Jordan not understand basketball? Did Tom Brady not grasp football? Quite the opposite. Because Brady understood football, he had a head coach, an offensive coach, a quarterback coach, and a fitness coach.
Brady understood precisely that he had to develop his game continuously. And he understood that within a team sport, developing alone was pointless. He had to develop together with his team. First: understand what and how to develop. Then: implement. Finally: make sure the team learns about the change. What good is a new passing route if the wide receivers don’t know it and run old ones? Without involving the entire offense, Brady’s development could never become effective.
The Leadership Formula
What applies to the GOAT in football also applies to top leaders. It can be expressed in a simple formula:
Impact = Insight × Implementation × Perception
Insight means analyzing and deciding in which direction a leader should develop. Implementation is where the leader puts insights into practice through personal behavior. Perception is the number of people who actually notice the change.
The three parts are linked multiplicatively, because insight without implementation is fruitless, implementation without insight is aimless and implementation without perception is pointless. Only when all three components work together does real impact follow. Impact in the form of more effective leadership and better results.
The formula is not rocket-science. Its simplicity is the point. It helps leaders reflect on three areas and see how these connect. Yet most leadership development focuses on Insight alone. Insight is never enough. If it were, no one would be overweight. The core insight for losing weight — eat less, move more — is universally known. Yet insight without action changes nothing. Imagine losing 20 pounds and nobody notices. Perception leads to satisfaction. The same applies to leadership.
You might believe you understand your own behavior and where to improve. Whether your stakeholders see it the same way is a completely different question. And here is an open secret: the higher you rise, the less feedback you receive. Let’s assume you get
honest feedback. What do you do with it? Think yourself into new behaviors?
Like always – the real challenge lies in implementation. Anyone who has tried to change their own behavior knows this: the brain resists. Yes, neuroplasticity exists well into old age. New behaviors can be learned. But it takes energy. Active effort. Effort that comes on top of an already demanding job in today’s VUCA world. There is no way around it. The work must be done. Or, as the great leadership expert Arnold Schwarzenegger put it: “No one has ever gotten muscles by watching me train!”
Even after thorough implementation, the work is not done. Have you ever experienced your parents treating you like a child after you turned 40? Changing stakeholder perceptions doesn’t happen by chance. It is hard, intentional work. As the Brady analogy shows: your employees and colleagues must experience the changed leadership behavior firsthand. People have mental inertia. You get put in a box quickly. Getting out takes much longer.
The best change means nothing if people still see the old you. Every leader who has tried to anchor an organizational vision knows this: it takes far more communication than you ever expected. Without all three components working together, leadership development has no real impact. You might as well save the money.
The Formula Works
If all three pieces work together, real impact happens. The evidence is clear. Marshall Goldsmith’s study “Leadership as a Contact Sport” examined more than 11,000 leaders with more than 86,000 respondents. The finding: when all three factors work together, leadership effectiveness improves the most. The more actively participants worked on their behavior after feedback — and the more they asked their organization about perceived changes — the better their leadership ratings became.
Alan Mulally applied the formula implicitly when he turned Ford around in the mid-2000s. He led by example: working with a coach, communicating continuously with his team, providing psychological safety, even before the phrase existed. The result was one of the most successful turnarounds in automotive history. It earned him CEO of the Year.
The authors see the same pattern in their daily work with top leaders. When the organization is actively asked for feedback, when that feedback sparks a behavioral change pursued consistently, and when the leader’s environment is continuously asked whether they notice the change – only then does real impact emerge. Not a little. Decisively.
How to Make It Happen
At first sight, the formula appears rigorous and technical. But it works. It delivers lasting impact. Take it as a mental model. Its effectiveness requires three things: courage, humility, and discipline. Courage to openly communicate your own imperfections.
Humility to accept feedback without bias. Discipline to follow the formula over 6–12 months of initial training. After that, it becomes your personal development philosophy.
Implementing an effective process for optimizing the formulas impact is simple, but not easy. Three recommendations help:
First: Don’t search for insights alone. Ask the people in your organization. They may know you better than you know yourself. Brady studied game footage together with the offense after every game and reworked the game plan before the next one.
Second: Apply new behaviors where they are meant to have an effect — in your organization. Brady didn’t practice plays alone. He practiced with his team.
Third: Regularly, e.g., every 4-6 weeks, ask members of your organization whether they have noticed your improved leadership behavior. Simply by asking, both sides become more attentive. Impact occurs.
The formula works best when pursued through a structured process over a longer period. Impact takes time. It does not happen overnight. Lasting behavioral changes only emerge after months. A strong process ensures discipline and quality. Finally, a
trusted coach helps with all three parts of the formula. After all, it was Bill Belichick who helped make Tom Brady the GOAT.
