HR teams may be balancing a seemingly never-ending number of plates at the moment, but one key area of focus, as found in our 2022 Client Survey, is the need to develop managers and leaders of the future.

So, we’ve put together 5 ways to nurture your future leaders.

1. Your EVP should be for everyone

To craft a sustainable employer brand and EVP you must invest in more than just talent attraction and candidate experience. It should support all employees throughout their entire journey with you, and you need to be investing in your existing talent and ensuring they have just as many opportunities as new talent do. 

Because if you’re hoping to support the future leaders of your business then you need to make efforts to not only attract great talent but retain them too.

2. Leaders don’t just grow on trees

Future leaders don’t just happen, there are many elements that go into being a great leader and a lot of these skills need to be taught.

When you see the potential for a future manager it’s crucial that you make efforts to harness that and put in place ways to build them up to developing into the leader you know they can be.

Be supportive, not every decision they make will be your ideal course of action but supporting them through it demonstrates trust and respect that can help individuals learn and grow.

3. Build strong foundations

Being a good leader, however, goes further than just technical skills and experiences. The key is the ability to lead, manage and coach people. So how can you ensure your employees are learning this?

Giving them exposure to the business as a whole can be a great way for them to come out of their comfort zone, work with new people and spark their creative and innovative thinking.

First-hand experience adapting to working with a myriad of departments and people can help develop their people skills and push them further towards becoming great leaders.

4. Give them something to own

There’s a fine line between nurturing and mollycoddling. Once an individual has learnt those skills and created those foundations it’s time to put them into practice.

So put them in real business situations and give them ownership of projects of varying difficulty. This will reveal their capabilities and capacities and develop their critical and creative thinking skills when faced with unfamiliar tasks. As a leader you also need to be able to make mistakes, to own that – and know how to best rectify the situation.

5. Foster their confidence

So, you’ve enhanced their skills, guided them through many challenges and harnessed their potential. What now?

Despite having all the right skills if they’re not confident in themselves then leadership will only ever exist in their title.

Continually giving them ownership of projects and ensuring you’re providing good feedback and praise is the first part to fostering confidence.

But don’t stop there, help them define their career goals and guide them to possible ways of achieving them. Have they got mentors and realistic role models to help them? Rather than completely throwing them in the deep end they can continue to be supported until they’re ready to set sail alone.

If this has got you interested, why not get in touch to find out more at hello@welovechatter.com