Evaluation of Leadership Training and Resilience Development Outcomes during the COVID-19 Pandemic

ABSTRACT

Human service organizations can support leaders through training to become resilient, adaptive, and innovative during rapid complex changes. This qualitative descriptive exploratory research study reports findings on a leadership resilience training program using online evaluation surveys of 56 directors and managers in a large Canadian not-for-profit mental health/substance abuse agency. Thematic data analysis and descriptive statistics revealed positive training outcomes on four levels: satisfaction; knowledge/skills; work/team performance; and organizational resilience/sustainability. Leaders identified adaptive, resilient, and authentic leadership styles, clan/adhocracy organizational cultures, psychological safety and innovation, and organizational preparedness as important to successfully manage the pandemic and future extraordinary organizational challenges.

Practice Points

1. Leaders’ satisfaction with training structure/content was high; ensuring topic relevance, including small group discussions and team-building opportunities are valuable.

2. Leaders’ knowledge/skills improvements were very/mostly high; they learned coping and resilience strategies to build with their staff and nurture organizational sustainability.

3. Anticipated positive impacts on work/team performance were extremely/very/mostly high, including change management abilities, supporting the goal of training transfer.

4. Organizational resilience/sustainability was very/mostly high, with planned meeting restructuring, although intentional implementation of actionable steps is required.

5. Leaders endorsed adaptive, resilient, and authentic leadership styles, clan, and adhocracy organizational cultures, psychological safety/innovation for organizational sustainability.

KEYWORDS:

• COVID-19 pandemic
• leadership development
• leadership styles
• organizational culture
• resilience
• training outcomes

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada under Partnership Engage Grant [892-2021-0089], King’s University College internal grant, and Renison University College internal grant [600].