Does This Work?
The ROI of Developmental Leadership
You've been asked to justify the investment. Again.
Your CFO wants numbers. Your board wants proof. And you're pitching something that sounds — to skeptics — like feelings work.
We get it. Leadership development has an ROI problem. Too many programs promise transformation and deliver PowerPoint.
So let's be concrete.
The Cost of Skipping It
Executive turnover: $100K–$300K per departure
Failed change initiatives: $500K–$2M+ in sunk costs
Unproductive meetings: 50 people × 5 wasted hours/week = 13,000 hours/year
Burnout attrition: 20–50% of salary per person
These aren't abstract risks. They're what happens when organizations lack capacity to face complexity — when technical fixes replace adaptive work, conflict gets personal, and real challenges stay buried.
What Development Delivers
Across long-term partnerships, we see consistent shifts in how people work together.
Money
Fewer external hires (stronger internal pipeline)
Lower turnover (people stay when they're growing)
Faster change (fewer stalled initiatives)
Market Position
Faster decisions (teams that handle conflict move faster)
Cross-silo collaboration (shared language helps)
More innovation (psychological safety unlocks experimentation)
Risk & Retention
Higher retention among high performers
Better decisions (diagnosis before action)
Higher speak-up rates on safety, ethics, and conflicts of interest
How We Measure
We don't arrive with a pre-built ROI calculator. Your system is unique.
Instead, we work with you to define success — then design learning that moves people toward it. That might include:
Baseline assessments and 360 feedback
Behavior tracking over time
Retention and engagement metrics
Follow-up interviews 3–6 months post-program
Stories of individual and team change
The goal: track whether the capacities you're building show up in how people lead.
Impact in Practice
Here's what this looks like in organizations we've partnered with for years.
The Wexner Foundation — 7 Years
Started with 15 fellows. Now: 700 fellows annually across five programs, plus 3,000+ alumni sharing a common language for complex challenges.
Fellows return to lead hundreds of synagogues, schools, camps, and nonprofits. One program, exponential ripple effects.
"We share a philosophy of leadership education, but also a philosophy of growth and iteration. It is a learning relationship." — Or Mars, Vice President, The Wexner Foundation
KAUST — National Transformation
Saudi Arabia's graduate research university needed to build leadership capacity during rapid national change. Challenge: how to hold difficult conversations in a culture that tends toward caution.
Year One: 100+ managers, nearly 100 case consultations. Since then: masterclasses, change management sessions, organization-wide interventions.
"KONU doesn't come in expecting one-and-done training. It's been a true partnership. They're adaptable, consistent, and willing to experiment." — Raymond Coderre, Head of Learning and Development, KAUST
Leading Global Hospitality Company — 800+ Executives
High-potential talent asked to perform and transform at once. We partnered with the internal learning team to integrate adaptive leadership into their global architecture — 30+ cohorts since 2022.
Outcomes: greater cross-boundary collaboration, clearer diagnosis of systemic challenges, more coherent leadership culture.
CASE STUDY COMING SOON
World-Class Research Institute
Deep expertise was both strength and constraint. We designed an intervention treating leadership as inquiry — helping scientists hold disagreement, surface assumptions, and experiment together.
Result: a shift from isolated problem-solving to collaborative exploration.
CASE STUDY COMING SOON
The Return
When people grow, systems move.
That's the ROI — not just better outcomes, but expanded capacity: the ability to face uncertainty, hold tension, collaborate across difference, and make progress when easy answers fall short.
Ready to explore what this could look like for you?