Editor’s Note
This article was adapted by EUVC from an original insight published by Zeren.
Leadership development is often organised around formal programmes, coaching and credentials. A Zeren LinkedIn poll series of more than 100 professionals points elsewhere: respondents said their growth came mainly from difficult experiences and personal initiative, while the most common management failure was keeping emerging leaders too far from important decisions.
The findings suggest a practical shift. Leadership development should be treated as a system of experiences, exposure and feedback, not simply a programme to complete.
Because the findings come from LinkedIn polls rather than a representative study, they should be read as directional signals from respondents, not universal benchmarks.
Key takeaways
Experience and initiative drove growth: 36% cited first-hand setbacks and challenges, while 32% pointed to self-directed development.
Presence and influence were the main next-role gaps: 39% selected executive presence and 32% stakeholder influence.
Decision exposure was the biggest management miss: 47% wished a past manager had shown them how consequential decisions were made.
Continuous learning was the strongest career accelerator: 54% chose learning and upskilling; 23% chose high-visibility projects.
Readiness was demonstrated through outcomes: 39% selected stronger team performance, 33% measurable results and 28% executive-level influence. No respondent selected training or credentials.
How leaders grow: Experience before formal development
Asked what had shaped their leadership growth most over the previous two years, respondents ranked direct experience above formal support:
36%: first-hand setbacks and challenges
32%: personal initiative, including self-directed learning and stretch goals
20%: a strong manager
12%: external coaching or mentorship
Zeren’s interpretation is not that managers, coaches or programmes have no value. It is that they work best as support around consequential practice. Leaders develop judgement by navigating ambiguity, recovering from setbacks and taking responsibility when there is no obvious answer.
For organisations, this means building a portfolio of development experiences: stretch assignments, cross-functional work and difficult operating situations with enough support that mistakes can become learning rather than career-ending events.
Which skills help people progress into senior roles?
Respondents were more concerned about relational and strategic skills than technical capability:
39%: executive presence
32%: stakeholder influence
21%: strategic thinking
7%: people leadership
Together, executive presence and stakeholder influence accounted for 71% of responses.
In this context, executive presence means communicating clearly under pressure, reducing complexity to a useful recommendation and expressing a considered view in senior settings. Stakeholder influence means understanding competing interests, building support across functions and aligning people before a decision reaches the formal meeting.
These capabilities are often expected without being taught. Emerging leaders can develop them by presenting to senior stakeholders, translating specialist work into business consequences and asking for specific feedback after high-stakes discussions. Managers can help by rehearsing difficult conversations, debriefing important meetings and giving people supervised access to senior forums.
Why decision proximity matters
When respondents considered what a past manager could have done to prepare them better:
47% wanted more exposure to decision-making
24% wanted more honest feedback
18% wanted to be challenged more
12% felt fully prepared
Decision proximity means giving an emerging leader enough access to observe how senior people assess trade-offs, work with incomplete information and reach a conclusion. It does not require inviting everyone into every decision.
Managers can create that proximity by bringing selected team members into strategy discussions, explaining the reasoning behind difficult calls and delegating decisions with coaching. This may take more time in the short term, but it develops the judgement and confidence required for larger roles.
What accelerates career progression?
Continuous learning was the most frequently selected career accelerator:
54%: continuous learning and upskilling
23%: high-visibility projects
15%: relationships and networking
8%: delivering through crisis or change
Zeren distinguishes continuous learning from collecting qualifications. The useful behaviour is staying curious, seeking feedback and closing capability gaps before they become constraints.
Visibility also matters. Strong work is more likely to create opportunity when its contribution is understood across the organisation. Cross-functional projects, sponsorship from senior colleagues and work tied to important business priorities can make impact easier to see without turning development into self-promotion.
What signals readiness for senior leadership?
Respondents prioritised evidence of impact:
39%: elevating team performance
33%: delivering measurable results
28%: influencing at executive level
0%: training or credentials earned
The result supports Zeren’s view that senior leadership is demonstrated through outcomes, especially outcomes achieved through other people. Improving team performance indicates a move from individual execution towards building systems, developing talent and creating the conditions for others to succeed.
Credentials may still support development, but in this poll they were not selected as evidence of readiness. Organisations should therefore examine whether promotion criteria reward demonstrated impact, judgement and team development rather than tenure or course completion.
For additional context on matching leadership capability to a company’s operating needs, see the related EUVC guide to hiring the right startup leader for your stage.
A practical leadership-development blueprint
For aspiring leaders
Choose stretching work. Seek assignments that require judgement beyond your current routine while remaining close enough to your experience to learn safely.
Practise presence and influence. Turn complex work into clear recommendations, build support across functions and ask for feedback on how you operate under pressure.
Make impact understandable. Prioritise work that matters to the business and communicate its contribution clearly.
Own the development plan. Identify what the next role demands and close the most important gaps deliberately.
Learn to improve outcomes through others. Senior leadership depends on what a leader enables, not only what they deliver personally.
For managers
Create decision proximity. Bring emerging leaders into key decisions regularly, including a monthly rotation where practical. Let them observe, contribute to and gradually own important calls.
Combine stretch with support. Scope assignments roughly 10–20% beyond current capability, with clear guardrails, feedback and access to help.
Give candid, specific feedback. Explain what needs to change and why, particularly after consequential moments.
Sponsor talent into visible work. Create access to cross-functional projects, senior readouts and recognition for meaningful contributions.
Coach presence and influence directly. Rehearse, observe and debrief the situations in which those skills matter.
For organisations
Design development around experiences. Use rotations, cross-functional assignments and demanding operating situations as the core curriculum.
Promote for impact through others. Look for evidence that a candidate improves team performance and builds repeatable systems.
Create fair paths to visibility. Make high-impact work accessible to emerging leaders, not only to people already close to senior management.
Reward continuous learning. Recognise people who update their skills and apply what they learn.
Teach managers how to develop judgement. Leadership pipelines weaken when managers delegate tasks but retain all context and decisions.
The poll findings do not make formal learning irrelevant. They suggest that its value depends on what happens around it. Development becomes tangible when people can practise judgement, receive honest feedback and produce results through others.
About the original author
Chris Preston is CEO of Zeren and Renoir. He leads both companies’ global teams and has more than 20 years of experience building teams, brands and businesses. He has worked with clients internationally across permanent hiring, interim leadership and consulting solutions.
Source
This article was adapted by EUVC from an original article published by Zeren.
