The effectiveness of managerial leadership development programs: a meta-analysis of studies from 1982-2001

By Doris B. Collins, Elwood F. Holton III. 2004

523 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Eighty-three studies from 1982 to 2001 with formal training interventions were integrated via meta-analytic techniques to determine the effectiveness of interventions in their enhancement of performance, knowledge, and expertise at the individual, team or group, or organizational level. The studies were separated by research design, with the outcome measure of the intervention as the unit of analysis. The effect size for knowledge outcomes ranged from .96 to 1.37; expertise outcomes from .35 to 1.01; and system outcomes averaged .39. Interventions with knowledge outcomes were found to be more effective than in the Burke and Day (1986) meta-analysis, with the most effective interventions using a single group pretest-posttest research design. Methodological and conceptual differences in Burke and Day's meta-analysis on the effectiveness of managerial training make historical comparisons risky. The data suggest that practitioners can attain substantial improvements in both knowledge and skills if sufficient front-end analysis is conducted to assure that the right development is offered to the right leaders.

Subfields: Applied Psychology, Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/16e75ad31c865182dedbe475536fb61a5bfe918b

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In Applied Psychology

In Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management

Citations in the corpus

The Science of Training and Development in Organizations (2012, background): “…and based on the science of learning and training, it yields positive results (Arthur, Bennett, Edens, & Bell, 2003; M. J. Burke & Day, 1986; Collins & Holton, 2004; Keith & Frese, 2008; Morris & Robie, 2001; Powell & Yalcin, 2010; Salas et al., 2008; Salas, Nichols, & Driskell, 2007;…”
Mentoring Impact on Leader Efficacy Development: A Field Experiment (2011, background): “…development efforts, there is some independent and metaanalytic research that offers preliminary evidence supporting various training interventions focused on enhancing management and leadership development outcomes (Arthur, Bennett, Edens, & Bell, 2003; Burke & Day, 1986; Collins & Holton, 2004).”
Multiple faces of coaching: Manager-as-coach, executive coaching, and formal mentoring. (2012, background): “There are surprisingly few studies (i.e., Collins & Holton, 2004; Douglas & Morley, 2000; Kilburg, 2000) that document the effectiveness of executive coaching as measured by changed leadership behavior using accepted empirical methods.”
Leadership development practice bundles and organizational performance: The mediating role of human capital and social capital (2018, background): “However, to date, the effects of LDPs on organizational performance remain largely unexplored, both theoretically and empirically (Collins & Holton, 2004; Richard, Holton, & Katsioloudes, 2014).”
Evaluation of a Long-Term Transformational Leadership Development Program (2011, background): “Meta-analytic results show that leadership development programs produce positive outcomes with effect sizes ranging from 0.35 to 1.37 (e.g., Burke & Day, 1986; Collins & Holton, 2004).”
A meta-analytic review of leadership impact research: Experimental and quasi-experimental studies (2009, background): “In a follow-up meta-analysis of 83 studies reported in the literature from 1982 to 2001, Collins and Holton (2004) replicated earlier findings showing that managerial training produced positive outcomes, with effect sizes ranging from .”
Games Managers Play: Play as a Form of Leadership Development (2011, background): “Over the past decade, research attention has been devoted to the theory and practice of leadership development (e.g., Avolio & Hannah, 2008; Collins & Holton, 2004; Day, Zaccaro, & Halpin, 2004; DeRue & Ashford, 2010).”