While artificial intelligence (AI) has had a starring role in overall learning and development (L&D) lately, it has been more of a cameo for leadership development. But that role has started to evolve over the last year, according to the 9th Annual Leadership Development Survey conducted in partnership between Training magazine and Wilson Learning Worldwide Inc. Survey results show that the number of organizations experimenting with or actively using AI in leadership development rose 12 percent from 2024 to 2025. Furthermore, high-performing companies rated the effectiveness of emerging tech such as AI as a delivery method for leadership development at 53 on a 0-100 scale.
As one survey respondent noted, “By integrating AI into leadership programs, we improve engagement, scalability, and data-driven decision-making, ensuring a more adaptive and impactful leadership pipeline.”
The survey also found that emerging technologies such as AI jumped five ranks to #8 on the priority list for leadership skills. “In today’s AI-driven workplace, leaders need to focus on how to use AI to improve team efficiency while maintaining sensitivity to technology and a sense of ethical responsibility,” another survey respondent said. “This means we not only need to master the basic knowledge of AI technology but also understand its applications in business and how to maintain balance and efficiency in human-machine collaboration.”
Recent studies by The Conference Board found that the skills of a company’s leaders can predict its market performance. Unfortunately, McKinsey found that only 11 percent of executives agreed that their leadership efforts achieve the desired results.
So the question becomes: What are high-performing organizations doing differently with leadership development than lower-performing ones?
To find out, we surveyed 1,000-plus Learning and Development (L&D) professionals on areas related to leadership development ranging from financial investment and senior executive support to development methods (including AI) and impact measurement. Their input helped create a potential roadmap for organizations to follow to boost the effectiveness of their leadership development and organizational performance.
TRAINING INVESTMENT TRACK
Total training and development spending per employee declined just under 15 percent from last year. That said, overall training investment is up 21 percent from the first survey, an average of 2.4 percent a year (less than the average inflation rate of 3.1 percent per year). We also have seen large fluctuations over the last nine years. There have been five increases (averaging 18.8 percent) and three decreases (averaging 19 percent).
The drop in overall training investment was modestly compensated for by a 1.5 percent increase in the percentage of training investment going to leadership development, perhaps some going toward AI exploration and/or implementation. Graph 1 shows that there was a drop in the number of organizations spending less than 10 percent of their training budget and an increase in those spending 30 percent or more on leadership development.
CHANGES IN PRIORITY SKILLS
We asked organizations to identify their top five priority leadership skills (Graph 2). While the top four skills remained the same (with coaching and communication remaining #1 and #2 for all nine years we’ve conducted this survey), this year saw the greatest number of rank order changes in the history of the survey. Twelve skills changed their ranking. The greatest increase in rank was for using emerging technologies (moving from #13 to #8). The greatest decreases were for diversity and inclusion skills (moving from #14 to #18) and providing feedback (#8 to #11).
GEN AI IN LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT
Generative AI technology continues to be a force in learning and development and now seems to be pushing into leadership development. We asked participants to describe their use of generative AI in their leadership development (Graph 3). The largest group of organizations (33 percent) have not explored generative AI for leadership development yet, but this is significantly down from 48 percent last year. On the flip side, the number of organizations experimenting with or actively using AI for leadership development has grown, rising from 23 percent in 2024 to 35 percent this year. Some 17 percent of high-performing organizations are actively using AI for leadership development and rated it at 53 on a scale of 0-100 for effectiveness as a delivery method.
On average, respondents ranked the level of impact generative AI has had on leadership development at 32 on a scale of 0-100. For low-performing organizations, the level was 26; for moderate-performing ones, it was 31; and for high-performing ones, it was 42.
So what are those who are using or experimenting with generative AI in leadership development doing? Their responses indicate six primary development activities where generative AI has improved performance and efficiency:
1. Content development and refinement: Generative AI is being widely used to create, refine, and edit handouts, outlines, articles, playbooks, top sheets, and other learning materials. It also is being used for script writing, activity suggestions and organization, and identifying best practices and valuable content sources.
“Generative AI helps in the development of training materials by quickly generating case studies, learning scenarios, or even sessions tailored to specific challenges leaders face.” —Survey Respondent
2. Performance and feedback coaching: Personalized coaching and feedback can be delivered through AI chatbots, enhancing leadership skills. GenAI also can prompt leaders with reflective questions, helping them assess their performance and identify areas for growth. And leaders can use AI tools to ask questions and get insights on various leadership topics, helping them stay informed when navigating complex situations.
“I use genAI to develop leadership coaching prompts and outlines for quick coaching sessions for middle-level leaders.” —Survey Respondent
3. Voice and video creation: AI is used for voiceover generation, creating avatars, and producing videos to enhance eLearning.
“We have created several eLearning modules using AIcreated videos to shorten the learning duration and make videos look livelier.” —Survey Respondent
4. Scenario-based training content: AI-driven simulations and scenario-based activities help leaders practice handling workplace challenges in a risk-free environment.
“We are piloting programs in a virtual environment where conversational AI avatars can simulate challenging team dynamics or conflicts, allowing users to practice resolving disputes and giving constructive feedback. AI can then analyze these sessions for communication patterns, decision-making processes, and interactions to offer insights into an individual’s leadership style and areas for improvement.” —Survey Respondent
5. Translation and global reach: GenAI assists in translating content for a global audience, making training materials accessible globally.
“GenAI has been a great time saver in translating textbased materials, audios, and videos. This has helped us in addressing the needs of non-English speakers.” —Survey Respondent
6. Skill and competency mapping: GenAI can match skills and competencies that learning programs help develop with the behavioral traits that are aligned with success in an organization.
“We have used genAI to identify the top development skills needed for leaders based on the notes provided in their check-ins and one-on-ones.” —Survey Respondent
AI CONCERNS AND BARRIERS
Participants identified several ongoing concerns and challenges in implementing generative AI in leadership development within their organizations. The top three are:
1.Security: The #1 concern continues to be data security, especially with more public AI systems.
“Our greatest concern is ensuring security and confidentiality of the data used to create a script, summary, etc.” —Survey Respondent
2.Cost and time investment: As new generative AI tools come to market, they often carry a price tag, especially as free open-source tools have added size restrictions.
“Scaling the costs becomes a barrier as we add users, as well as the expected outcomes of each AI tool.” —Survey Respondent
3.Lack of accuracy: Generative AI results have a host of potential challenges, including accuracy, adaptability, and bias mitigation.
“One of the primary challenges is ensuring accuracy and reliability. AI-generated insights and recommendations need to be carefully validated to avoid misinformation or biased conclusions.” —Survey Respondent
HIGHLY EFFECTIVE LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT
While good training is part of effective leadership development, results indicate that effectiveness goes beyond just training. As in past years, we included a measure of leadership development effectiveness to differentiate highly effective leadership development from lower-performing leadership development efforts.
Through our research, we identified outcomes that define leadership effectiveness. These six indicators are measures of leadership development impact that experts agree provide a reliable indication of leadership development performance.
- Leadership is a source of competitive advantage: Do senior executives acknowledge the importance of leadership development to the organization’s success?
- Best-in-class leaders: Are other companies trying to recruit their leaders?
- Attracting high potentials: Does the organization’s approach to leadership attract high-potential leaders from other organizations?
- No leadership gaps: Does the organization have significant gaps in leadership capacity?
- Sufficient resources: Does the organization have the necessary resources to effectively develop its leaders?
- Sufficient leadership bench strength: How satisfied is the company with its ability to replace departing leaders?
By combining these six measures and then ranking organizations from high-performing to lower-performing, we create a measure of overall leadership effectiveness.
The results show that effective leadership development requires seven critical components:
- Involving executives in leadership development
- Identifying new leaders early
- Supporting new leaders in their transition
- Using the right development methods
- Assisting leaders in taking responsibility for their development
- Providing manager coaching and feedback
- Using multiple approaches to track impact
EXECUTIVE INVOLVEMENT
Executive involvement in leadership development is significantly greater in high-performing organizations (Graph 4). On average, more than 75 percent of high-performing organizations engage executives in multiple activities, compared to only 39 percent of low-performing organizations. High-performing organizations are significantly more likely to have executives who communicate the value of leadership development, actively model leadership behaviors, set clear expectations for leadership development, sponsor leadership community efforts, and lead sessions and/or record videos for leadership programs.
IDENTIFY NEW LEADERS EARLY
To train new leaders effectively, you must first identify those with high potential for success. Graph 5 shows that more than 80 percent of high-performing organizations take active steps to identify new leaders, but less than 40 percent of low-performing organizations do the same. The actions high-performing organizations take include identifying high-potential leaders early, creating succession plans, and strategizing how to attract younger employees to leadership positions.
TRANSITION SUPPORT
Research by MindTools indicates that half of new managers receive no training before moving into their first management position. So providing support for this transition is critical. Some 87 percent of high-performing organizations take action to support new leaders through their transition, compared to only 38 percent of lower-performing ones. Five specific actions differentiate higher-performing from lower-performing organizations (Graph 6). High-performing organizations develop potential leaders early in their career, provide more advanced leadership skills training throughout their career, help manage their expectations, provide overlap with the previous leader, and mentor during their transition.
DEVELOPMENT METHODS
While learning programs are essential to developing new leaders, they alone are not sufficient if you want strong and effective leaders. We found six specific actions that more than 80 percent of high-performing organizations take that lower-performing organizations do not (Graph 7). High-performing organizations are more likely to use collaborative platforms to share knowledge, provide stretch assignments, have new managers rotate positions to work with a variety of current leaders, provide peer support networks, and offer opportunities to represent the company in industry and community meetings.
SELF-DEVELOPMENT SUPPORT
Organizations increasingly are asking leaders to take personal responsibility for their own development. A differentiating factor between high- and low-performing organizations is the level of support they provide to new leaders in accepting this responsibility. Graph 8 shows that high-performing organizations support this effort by making leadership development a key performance indicator (KPI), using stretch assignments to guide development choices and providing 360-degree or self-assessments of leadership skills.
The involvement of the new leaders’ direct manager also is critical to leadership development success. The survey found that current leaders of high-performing organizations are more likely to document critical processes and coach and support emerging leaders.
TRACKING IMPACT
A clear distinction between high- and low-performing organizations is their commitment to measuring the impact of their leadership development efforts. On average, high-performing organizations are more likely to use four or more approaches to measure impact, while the majority of low-performing organizations use only one method, and 30 percent do not measure impact at all.
What are high-performing organizations looking at when measuring impact? Graph 9 shows that the three most often used metrics are engagement, business results, and 360-degree changes in behavior.
TIPS AND TAKEAWAYS
An effective plan to improve leadership development requires focused action. To this end, nearly 400 respondents shared their ideas for how they improved their leadership development. Their best practices echoed many of the outcomes of this survey. These best practices suggest several concrete actions organizations can take to strengthen their leadership development efforts:
• Tailor learning to the leaders: Learning customized to individual strengths and needs is more impactful and shortens time to effectiveness. Emerging technology, especially generative AI, is making the personalization of learning for the specific needs of smaller groups, and individuals, more cost effective.
BEST PRACTICE: “Use technology to create personalized, experiential learning opportunities that align with real-world challenges leaders face, combining practical simulations, feedback loops, and continuous development to ensure lasting impact and growth.”
• Involve executives: While most senior executives see leadership development as a priority, the executive team needs guidance on how to best be involved and determine the specific actions that will have the greatest impact.
BEST PRACTICE: “It is critical to have senior and executive leaders aligned and committed on leadership development. If you have buy-in and support at this level, leadership development becomes part of the organizational culture.”
• Encourage real-time feedback and coaching: Both the survey results and the participants’ best practices show the critical value of new leaders having good managers as mentors and coaches. New leaders need someone available to share experience, provide guidance, and reflect on actions.
BEST PRACTICE: “Promote a culture of continuous learning and feedback. Build mechanisms for regular feedback from peers, mentors, and direct reports to support growth.”
• Choose the right development methods: Leadership development is much more than leadership training programs. Effective leadership mirrors the real world, and this needs to be incorporated into leadership development efforts. Coaching, mentoring, peer networks, action learning, and challenge assignments all need to be part of the overall plan. High-performing organizations build multiple collaborative learning experiences into their leadership development, whether in person, remotely, or digitally.
BEST PRACTICE: “Bring together a variety of approaches to identify effective practices and refine existing training strategies. By emphasizing experiential learning, such as taking on challenging projects or cross-functional roles, employees can develop a broader skill set and a deeper understanding of the business.”
• Include measurement and accountability: While forgoing measurement of the impact of leadership development is tempting due to its cost and difficulty, it is increasingly important to use solid business metrics to measure the effectiveness of programs, make adjustments based on feedback and results, and demonstrate that your efforts have a measurable impact on organizational performance. AI can help in automating surveys to gather and analyze insights on leadership effectiveness.
BEST PRACTICE: “If you are not currently measuring the business impact of leadership development, how can you tell if it is successful? Measurement is critical for determining effectiveness. Create outcome measurements before implementation and act on the results. It is not what you know that counts, it’s what you do with what you know that has impact.”
AWARD-WINNING DEVELOPMENT
Tighter budgets due to the current tumultuous financial markets and the continued evolution of emerging technologies are creating an opportunity for organizations to experiment and discover creative ways to deliver award-winning leadership development and blockbuster organizational success. Are you ready? As they say in the movies, “ACTION!”
SURVEY METHODOLOGY
Some 1,045 Learning and Development (L&D) professionals responded to the 2025 Leadership Development survey. Over the nine years the survey has been conducted, we have collected data from approximately 8,500 professionals. All were employees of companies that create and use leadership development services with their own employees; we exclude external providers of learning and development services from the results.
The majority of respondents (59 percent) had management responsibility, with the largest groups with titles of Manager (26 percent), Director (20 percent), and VP or higher (14 percent).
Approximately half of respondents (58 percent) operated only in the United States; the remaining were composed of multinational and global companies (both at 21 percent). Organizations were evenly distributed in company size, ranging from less than 100 employees to greater than 50,000, with the largest group (24 percent) having 1,000 to 5,000 employees.