Leadership development

Why leadership training doesn't stick, and what sprints do differently

Helen Bryant [19.10.26] · 7 min read

A manager I coached had done the lot. An MBA. Two leadership programmes. A shelf of books they had read, with the pages turned down. They could explain delegation, coaching and stakeholder mapping better than most people I meet.

And they were still stuck. Still firefighting, still the person everyone came to for answers, still working evenings to catch up on the thinking they hadn't had time to do in the day.

What they were missing was practice.

That is the problem I see more than any other, and it is the reason I now do almost all of my work in sprints.

Why doesn't leadership training stick?

Most leadership development stops at the knowing.

You go on the course, you watch the video, you listen to the podcast on the drive in. It is comfortable, it is useful, and you come away with good ideas. Then Monday arrives, the inbox is full, there is a problem with a client, and by Thursday the good ideas have been put on a shelf for "when things calm down".

Things don't calm down. You know that already.

The training was probably good. The trouble is that leadership is a practice game. You cannot learn a coaching conversation from a video alone. You have to have one, notice what happened, and try again. The same is true of a difficult conversation, a delegation conversation, or managing up to a boss who changes their mind every week.

Technical skills are easier to learn in a classroom. People skills are learned in the room with people.

The model

What is the Practice Zone?

The Practice Zone is my model for how leaders actually develop. It has three zones.

  1. ZONE 1

    The Knowing Zone

    Where most development stops

    The theory. Books, podcasts, courses and workshops.

  2. ZONE 2

    The Practice Zone

    Where confidence grows

    The gap between knowing and doing. You reflect, practise, try things differently, get feedback and accept that some of it won't go well the first time. It feels uncomfortable, and you should expect that, because that is what learning feels like.

  3. ZONE 3

    The Competence Zone

    Where the skill becomes a habit

    You can do it without thinking about it. The skill has become a habit, and it shows up in your week without you having to remember it.

The magic happens in the Practice Zone. The trouble is that most busy managers never get to spend enough time there, because nothing in their week is built to keep them in it.

The 20% who keep coming back

Over years of running corporate programmes, I have noticed something.

20%

of people proactively manage their own development. The rest go in bursts and stops.

The 20% are just as busy as everyone else. What they do differently is refuse to ignore the gap. They schedule their practice, they plan it, and they keep coming back to what they are trying to get better at.

Little and often beats a burst and then nothing. A sprint is designed to make everyone behave like the 20%.

What makes a sprint different from a workshop?

A workshop

Gives you a great day.

A sprint

Gives you a great day, and then six weeks of putting it to work.

The way I run sprints, there are a few things that make the difference.

  1. A short, focused kick-off

    Usually in person. We build the foundation and each person leaves with their own action plan, built around their real work.

  2. Weekly coaching sessions

    Around an hour each, built around what is happening as people put their plan into practice. What worked, what didn't, what to try next.

  3. Practice challenges between sessions

    Small, specific things to try in the week ahead. I call them think experiments, because it takes away the pressure of getting it right.

  4. Accountability built in

    You know you will be back in the room next week, so you do the thing.

  5. One focused sprint at a time

    A small number of skills, practised properly.

  6. Most of the time in a sprint is spent on the job, and that matters, because the job is where the learning is.

Director, Head of, VP

What this looks like for a senior leader

If you are a Director, Head of or VP, you have probably been on more leadership programmes than anyone in your team. You are also the person with the least time to practise what they taught you.

At your level the stakes of staying in the Knowing Zone are higher. When you are reactive, it cascades across your whole function and it feeds operational noise up into the boardroom. You know you should be delegating the thinking as well as the tasks. You know you should be building strategic thinkers below you. Knowing it hasn't made it happen.

A sprint gives you a protected, structured reason to practise the handful of behaviours that change how your function runs, and someone to be honest with you about how it is going.

A few years into managing a team

What this looks like for a mid-level manager

If you are a few years into managing a team, the gap usually looks like this. You know you should coach more, delegate better and plan ahead. You just can't work out when.

A sprint answers the "when". It turns the good intention into a small weekly practice that fits inside the week you already have, and over six to eight weeks those small practices become the way you work.

For HR and L&D

Why sprints make sense for organisations

If you work in HR or L&D, none of this will be news to you. You have probably watched a well-received programme get great feedback scores and then disappear without a trace in the way managers actually behave.

Meanwhile the fallout of that gap lands on your desk. The performance conversation that should have happened in a one-to-one three months ago. The conflict that festered because a manager avoided it. Issues that are far more expensive to sort out in week 12 than in week 1.

Sprints are built for the application gap.

  • Low time cost

    Managers spend most of the programme on the job.

  • Visible results

    Learning is tied to real work, so you can see it show up in team performance and in how managers handle issues at their own level.

  • Change that holds

    Everyone builds a shared language and a shared set of habits, which is what makes change hold across a team.

  • Easy to pilot

    A sprint with a pilot group of 10 to 20 managers is a practical way to test the value before a wider roll-out.

Think of it as building leadership infrastructure.

See programmes for organisations

Your practice challenge

Try this

  1. Pick one leadership skill you already know you should be using more. Coaching questions, delegating a piece of thinking, a quick stakeholder check-in. Just one.

  2. This week, find three small moments to try it. A five-minute conversation counts.

  3. After each one, write one line: what happened, and what you would do differently next time.

That is a week in the Practice Zone. Do it again next week. Progress over perfection.

Frequently asked questions

What is a leadership sprint?

A leadership sprint is a short, focused development programme, usually six to eight weeks, where managers learn a small number of leadership skills and practise them in their real work with weekly coaching and accountability. Helen Bryant runs AI Leadership Sprints, Coaching Sprints and one-to-one coaching sprints for leaders and organisations across the UK and Europe.

Why doesn't leadership training stick?

Most leadership training stops at the Knowing Zone: people learn the theory but have no structure for practising it once they are back at work. Leadership skills are mostly people and communication skills, which are learned through repeated practice and feedback.

What is the Practice Zone?

The Practice Zone is Helen Bryant's model of how leaders develop. It sits between the Knowing Zone (theory) and the Competence Zone (habit). It is where leaders practise, experiment, get feedback and build confidence. Helen's sprints are designed around keeping leaders in the Practice Zone long enough for new habits to form.

How long does it take to build a new leadership habit?

It varies, but a few weeks of little-and-often practice is far more effective than a single intensive day. That is why Helen's sprints run for six to eight weeks, with small weekly practice challenges between sessions.

Is a sprint better than a leadership workshop?

A workshop is good for building understanding. A sprint adds the weeks of practice, coaching and accountability that turn understanding into changed behaviour. Many of Helen's sprints start with a workshop day and then follow it with weekly coaching.

Can you learn leadership skills online?

You can learn the theory online. The skill itself is built by practising with real people in your real work. Online learning works best when it is paired with practice, reflection and feedback, which is how Helen's virtual sprint sessions are designed.

Helen
photo

About the author

Helen Bryant.

Helen Bryant is a leadership coach who helps senior managers and leaders build the systems, habits and human skills to lead well in an AI-enabled world. She spent more than 15 years in senior leadership roles at PepsiCo, Cadbury Schweppes and Britvic, and now coaches leaders and runs sprint-based leadership programmes for organisations across the UK and Europe. Her work is built on her own frameworks, including the Leader's Ladder, CAT (Clarity, Alignment, Trust), the Golden Hour and the AI Leadership Bullseye.

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