The authors analyze the performance and efficaciousness of agency-based leadership development programs, which ensure that leaders understand trends affecting their jobs, such as risk management or cybersecurity; such programs prepare future leaders for the rigors of driving action across the federal government’s $4.4 trillion enterprise that touches the lives of all Americans daily. The depth and breadth of current agency leadership programs vary widely, inhibiting systematic development of tomorrow’s government leaders.
The report explores five core topics: 1) factors that enable a sustainable agencybased leadership development program; 2) system-level challenges to creating and operating such programs; 3) training and development strategies that have had the most success in the federal government; 4) transferable lessons learned from exemplary agency programs; and 5) ways to demonstrate programmatic return-on-investment (ROI). The report underscores that federal organizations can mount successful leadership development programs, and that the effective practices they have identified provide excellent guides across all facets of the leadership development cycle—enabling government executives to tackle problems with fresh ideas and energy.LBJ School of Public Affair
