In today’s dynamic workplace, organizations increasingly recognize that developing talent is not just important — it’s essential for sustaining performance and growth. Yet despite the near-universal acknowledgement of its importance, a large gap remains between aspiration and action. Research from Deloitte’s 2025 Human Capital Trends Report reveals that while 73% of organizations believe redefining the manager’s role to focus on talent development is critical, only 25% have begun efforts to make this a reality. And despite evidence that intentional development efforts improve employee performance by 27%, many leaders aren’t making development a priority.
The truth is simple: Talent development professionals cannot do this alone. To scale the impact of talent development, we must empower others — especially leaders — to become developers of talent themselves. This article introduces a practical framework called “Practices of Development” (PODs) to make this vision a reality.
Why Leaders Must Become Developers of Talent
Leaders hold a unique leverage point. Their behaviors, good or bad, scale across teams and organizations. However, research shows that only about 13% of leaders spend significant time developing people, and many managers spend up to 40% of their time on non-managerial tasks. This imbalance leads to a missed opportunity not only for individual employee growth but also for team effectiveness and business outcomes.
Formal learning opportunities remain critical but are often limited. In an environment where learning increasingly needs to happen in the flow of work, the traditional model of relying solely on formal learning interventions is insufficient. Development must be democratized and integrated into the daily rhythm of work. Leaders must be empowered to take daily, meaningful actions that embed learning and development into routine activities.
We know that employees crave development opportunities. Yet if development only happens in formal training sessions or annual performance reviews, organizations miss countless opportunities to build skills, engagement, and career momentum in real-time. Leaders are uniquely positioned to close this gap — if they are given the right tools and support.
The Practices of Development (PODs) Framework
A Practice of Development (POD) is an intentional action or design choice made by a leader that creates a development moment in an employee’s day-to-day job. These practices don’t require removing people from their work for formal training; instead, they integrate into the daily rhythm of work, making development more accessible and impactful.
Why Focus on Leaders and PODs?
- Leaders Scale: Their actions and behaviors impact entire teams. What a leader models quickly becomes a norm within their team.
- PODs Are Lightweight: They don’t require massive time investments, making them feasible even in the busiest environments.
- Proximity to Work: Development happens at the point of need, not in a removed setting. This enhances relevance and immediate application.
- Promotes Dialogue: PODs encourage interaction and relationship-building between leaders and employees, strengthening trust and engagement.
By integrating development into the daily flow of work, we shift the narrative from “learning as an event” to “learning as a way of working.”
Examples of Practices of Development in Action
To bring the concept to life, here are some real-world examples of how organizations have implemented PODs:
Career Development POD: A mid-size company wanted to enhance career growth by focusing on people managers. Instead of relying solely on traditional training, they embedded small actions into managers’ daily tools (e.g., Google Docs, Slack). Nudges through email and in-person events encouraged behaviors like career conversations. As a result, targeted employee engagement survey scores improved 15-20% over three consecutive quarters.
Learning Thread: A team created a Slack thread where members posted something they learned each week. Five minutes of team meeting time was dedicated to sharing these learnings, creating a culture of continuous knowledge exchange. The regular cadence encouraged reflection and sharing without requiring formal programming.
Yearly Strategy Planning: A tech company added a development component to its annual planning process. Employees were asked to share a favorite project and something they’d like to explore. Leaders used this input to align future projects with employees’ growth interests, strengthening both engagement and strategic execution. Development was directly tied to business planning, making it actionable and business-aligned.
Learning Logs: A consumer goods business unit encouraged employees to track key learnings and milestones each quarter. Managers used these “learning logs” during 1:1s to fuel reflective conversations about growth and development, promoting a mindset of continuous improvement. These simple tools turned everyday work into rich opportunities for reflection and future growth.
Bullpen Sessions: A marketing team battling silos introduced “bullpen sessions” where individuals across teams shared best practices and learned from one another. This initiative improved knowledge transfer and fostered cross-functional collaboration. Employees were exposed to different perspectives and skills, helping broaden their capabilities.
Each 1 Teach 1: A remote-first company designed an “Each 1 Teach 1” game during their biannual in-person gatherings, allowing employees to teach peers new skills and ideas. This peer-to-peer learning not only democratized knowledge but also deepened team connections, encouraging a culture of mutual development.
These examples highlight how PODs can be embedded into routines, cultural moments, and business processes to make development part of everyday work, without adding extra burdens.
How to Build and Implement Your Own Practices of Development
Implementing PODs doesn’t require a massive overhaul. It follows a four-step process:
Step 1: Identify the Development Behaviors You Want to See
Start by reflecting: What does it look like when leaders develop their people? What small actions have helped you grow in your career?
Engage leaders and employees directly. Use listening sessions, surveys, or informal conversations to uncover what already works. Focus on being specific: granular behaviors are easier to design for and encourage.
Best practices:
- Begin with existing successful behaviors already happening within your organization.
- Validate assumptions with real leader and employee feedback.
- Frame development as a shared responsibility between leaders and employees.
Step 2: Find Moments in the Workflow
Don’t add new work — find natural moments where development can fit. Map out the leader and employee workflow and identify opportunities. Key categories include:
- Team Routines: Regular team meetings, check-ins, stand-ups.
- Moments of Change: Promotions, new projects, role transitions, onboarding new hires.
- Temporal Milestones: Annual reviews, quarterly planning, project kick-offs and closures.
- Connection Moments: Offsites, retreats, celebrations, company culture events.
Understanding these workflows helps integrate development where it’s most relevant and natural, ensuring it becomes part of the way work gets done.
Step 3: Create Tools That Enable Practices of Development
Tools make it easier for leaders to act. These can include:
- Calendar Nudges: Block time for reflection, career conversations, and learning debriefs.
- Templates: Pre-built prompts or scripts for career discussions or project retrospectives.
- Digital Interactions: Slack prompts, Lattice templates, automated reminders.
- Events: Piggyback development activities onto existing meetings and offsites.
- Activities: Quick exercises like “Share 1 Learning” or “Growth Goals” to facilitate reflection.
Think like a behavioral designer: Create frictionless, easy entry points for leaders to engage in development practices without it feeling like “extra work.” Meet leaders where they are with simple, actionable steps.
Examples include a “3 Questions” career reflection template added to existing 1:1 documents or a “Learning Roundtable” activity during a department offsite. The key is making it easy and accessible.
Step 4: Experiment, Measure, and Learn
Start small. Pilot with yourself, your team, or a group of eager leaders. Focus on learning what works before scaling.
Measurement Ideas:
- Quantitative:
- Improvements on engagement surveys tied to development themes.
- Pre/post assessments of leader confidence and employee growth outcomes.
- Qualitative:
- Direct feedback from employees and leaders.
- Stories and anecdotes that showcase impact.
- Observations of behavior change over time.
Adopt a scientific mindset: hypothesize, test, observe, and adjust. The goal isn’t perfection; it’s progress. Use what you learn to iterate and build momentum over time. Celebrate small wins and continually seek feedback to refine and improve your PODs.
Conclusion: Scaling Development Through Leaders
Embedding practices of development into leaders’ daily work is one of the most effective ways to scale talent development impact. By shifting from isolated formal training to everyday development moments, we:
- Meet employees at the point of need.
- Make growth a natural part of work.
- Strengthen leader-employee connections.
- Empower leaders to carry forward the mission of development.
Key Lessons to Remember:
- You can’t do it alone: Talent development must be scaled through others.
- Small actions matter: Tiny, intentional behaviors build over time.
- Workflow is key: Meet leaders where they already are.
- Model and amplify: Find existing bright spots and build from them.
- Design for behavior: Make it easy for leaders to act.
One Big Takeaway
Talent development is bigger than our individual efforts. By equipping leaders with simple, accessible practices of development, we turn leadership itself into a force for employee growth and organizational success.
When every leader becomes a developer of talent, we don’t just scale learning — we fundamentally transform our organizations for the better.