Here's a dirty secret about leadership training: we spend enormous amounts of time teaching people how to lead others but virtually no time helping them manage their own stress levels.
Then we act surprised when newly promoted managers burn out, make poor decisions, or turn into micromanaging nightmares because they're drowning in responsibilities they don't know how to handle.
I worked with a Perth-based company last year where three team leaders had resigned in six months. Not because they couldn't do the work, but because nobody had taught them how to manage the pressure that comes with being responsible for other people's performance.
The problem wasn't their leadership potential – it was that they were trying to lead while feeling completely overwhelmed. That's like trying to conduct an orchestra while having a panic attack. Technically possible, but the results are predictably awful.
Smart organisations now invest in stress management training before problems develop, not after their best people have already quit.
The Meeting Epidemic
Can we talk about meetings for a minute? Because nothing reveals poor leadership faster than watching someone struggle through a team meeting.
I've observed meetings where twenty minutes were spent discussing who should take notes, fifteen minutes debating whether to have another meeting, and exactly three minutes addressing the actual issue everyone came to discuss.
The worst part? Everyone knows these meetings are pointless, but nobody has the authority or confidence to say, "This is stupid, let's fix it."
Good leaders don't run meetings – they solve problems. Sometimes that happens in a conference room, sometimes it's a five-minute conversation at someone's desk, and sometimes it's a text message that prevents the need for any meeting at all.
But we don't teach this in leadership programmes. We teach "meeting facilitation skills" and "stakeholder engagement strategies" instead of helping people figure out when a meeting is actually necessary.
The Feedback Fiction
Leadership training loves talking about "creating a feedback culture" and "providing constructive criticism." Sounds lovely in theory. Completely useless in practice.
Most people struggle with feedback because they've been taught to sandwich criticism between compliments, use specific formulas, and follow elaborate protocols that make simple conversations feel like diplomatic negotiations.
Reality check: good feedback is usually pretty straightforward. "That report was excellent – the data analysis section particularly impressed the client." Or, "The presentation dragged on too long and lost the audience halfway through."
No feedback models required. Just honesty delivered with basic human decency.
The problem isn't that managers don't know how to give feedback – it's that they're terrified of how people might react. So they avoid difficult conversations, let problems fester, then wonder why performance reviews become hostile negotiations.
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