When I started in HR executive search 13 years ago, one of the most sought-after backgrounds was someone who had completed an HR Leadership Development Program (LDP) or rotational program. Companies intentionally exposed future HR leaders to Talent Acquisition, HR Business Partner roles, Compensation, Benefits, Labor Relations, Learning & Development, HR Operations, and manufacturing before they specialized. Those experiences created HR leaders with a broad business perspective, not just functional expertise.
The market rewards specialization. Organizations are searching for Heads of Total Rewards, HR Technology, People Analytics, Talent Acquisition, or HR Operations who have spent years building deep expertise in one discipline.
That shift made me wonder:
What happened to HR Leadership Development Programs?
Three trends may be driving the change:
- Prioritizing Vertical Growth Over Lateral Growth: Early-career HR professionals are encouraged to become experts as quickly as possible because the market rewards specialization. The challenge is that organizations often don’t emphasize cross-functional experience (I can make an argument it has shifted) until someone is being considered for senior leadership. By then, it’s much harder to build the enterprise perspective required to become a CHRO.
- Organizations May Question the ROI of Rotational Programs: Leadership development requires significant investment, yet employee tenure continues to decline. Many organizations have watched high-potential employees complete rotational programs only to be recruited away. It’s understandable that some companies have shifted toward developing immediate functional capabilities instead of long-term leadership pipelines. Ironically, companies that stop investing in development often create another retention problem, employees leave because they no longer see a growth path.
- Career Mobility Looks Very Different Today: Ten years ago, relocation was often expected as part of career development. Today, dual-career households, higher housing costs, remote work, and family commitments have made geographic mobility far less common. As a result, organizations have fewer opportunities to expose emerging leaders to different business units, plants, and markets through traditional rotational assignments.
Leadership Development Still Matters
Gartner continues to identify leader and manager development as HR’s top priority, while many organizations acknowledge they lack strong leadership pipelines. The issue isn’t that leadership development has become less important, it’s that the approach has changed.
The organizations building the strongest HR leaders tomorrow may not be those producing the deepest specialists. They’ll be the ones intentionally creating opportunities for high-potential talent to gain cross-functional exposure through enterprise projects, transformation initiatives, acquisitions, HR technology implementations, and business rotations.
Technical expertise gets someone into leadership. Broad business perspective is what prepares them to lead the entire HR function. Are HR Leadership Development Programs fading away, or have they simply evolved into something different?
About Jeff Wilbanks
Jeff is a seasoned executive search leader with deep expertise in building and strengthening human resources functions that directly enable business success. Over the course of his career, he has partnered with organizations at critical inflection points from high-growth companies seeking their first HR leader to complex, global enterprises evolving their talent strategy and operating model. To learn more about Jeff, visit his bio page.