Function Leader Development Experience

Called the “linchpin” of organizations, function leaders have arguably the greatest impact on your business performance. The criticality of function leadership to any high-performing organization led MDA to create FLDE based on our original research into the factors most predictive of excellence in the function leader role. This innovative 3-month development journey enables busy function leaders to accelerate business impact, improve leadership effectiveness, and enhance resilience and well-being.

Our open enrollment offering enables your leaders to learn from and form strong bonds with talented function leaders from across industries. Or let us tailor an experience exclusively for your business, upskilling your function leaders and strengthening cross-functional relationships across your organization. Join MDA for this powerful development journey that takes place live in Minneapolis in September 2023—secure your spot by June 2, 2023, and receive an early bird special.

Click here to read more information about the open enrollment 2023 Function Leader Development Experience.

To hear clients describe the value of the Function Leader Development Experience, visit the video library.

What are the five most critical roles for a function leader? Read our latest white paper today.

Why Attend FLDE?

A future of disruptions and uncertainty puts a premium on organizational capabilities to rapidly learn, pivot, and execute with agility. Function leaders are the “critical middle” who exercise these capabilities, serving as executors and reshapers of strategy in real time, vital talent developers, change leaders, internal influencers, and results drivers. As your function leaders succeed, so too does your organization. Their development represents your best investment. The career path of the function leader leads increasingly to the senior leadership table, with positions like CMO, CFO, and CHRO. Function leader development is an investment in those who play a central role in the current success of the business and will play an increasingly more critical role in its future success.

The FLDE In-Person Experience

MDA’s learning design ensures an exceptionally engaged and energizing experience that optimizes learning. The design includes carefully sequenced, multimodal activation experiences, simulations, small and large group discussions, on- and offline refreshers, and networking events with cross-organizational peer leaders. 

Who Should Attend FLDE?

Someone who is serving as a function leader—a director, executive director, vice president, or senior vice president—and who is:

• Assuming an expanding role or in consideration for a more strategic leadership role
• In a leadership role, but wants to become a stronger enterprise leader
• Virtually leading a distributed workforce and wrestling with today’s most pressing leadership demands
• Leading an operations, manufacturing, marketing, sales, finance or human resources function, or a business unit, geographic region, product group or customer segment

When confronted with new and challenging leadership disruptions, it’s normal for any leader to suddenly feel stressed and isolated. This cohort-based development experience is specifically designed to provide all participants with the confidence, connections, and collaborative support they need to lead more effectively as function leaders.

Key Business/Learning Outcomes

Using a blend of modalities, including in-person and virtual instructor-led sessions, FLDE delivers targeted development experiences, such as robust assessment, strong experientially based formal learning programs, cohort learning, and challenging work applications to better equip function leaders to maximize their development and contributions.

The FLDE program is built on a validated research model of the five pivotal roles that drive function leader success. Participants will grow in each of the following roles:

• Strategist: Ability to bridge where the function is now with where it needs to go
• Change Leader: Acts as a skillful sponsor and champion of effective change initiatives
• Talent Developer: Applies the mindset and tools to attract, develop, and retain key talent
• Internal Influencer: Thinks and works collaboratively across functions to influence
• Results Orchestrator: Achieves consistent, timely, high quality results through others

“We had a great experience with the Function Leader Development Experience (FLDE). The payoff has been even beyond what we expected for the business. The people we selected to attend now have a close cohort relationship. Since then, a few of the participants have been promoted and are well positioned as successors to senior executive roles.” – Alixandra Colehour, Vice President, Human Resources, Sleep Number