The document describes Zenger Folkman's strengths-based leadership development system called The Extraordinary Leader Workshop. It highlights research showing that building on existing strengths is 3 times more effective for leadership development than fixing weaknesses. The workshop uses a 360-degree assessment to help participants understand their leadership competencies and develop an individualized plan to magnify their strengths. Participants gain insights to improve performance and engagement for themselves and their teams.

1. Experience
THE EXTRAORDINARY
LEADER Workshop
Leverage the Power of Strengths-Based Leadership Development
Leadership effectiveness is the major performance factor.
Zenger Folkman’s extensive research studies correlating WORKSHOP AUDIENCE
300,000 people’s ratings of more than 35,000 managers
with performance outcomes found these dramatic The Extraordinary Leader process is being used exten-
differences between the weakest and strongest leaders: sively for individual leaders at all levels of an organization
from senior executives to first-line supervisors. Custom-
• 4 - 6 times higher profits ized in-house sessions are delivered to executive or man-
• 6 times higher sales revenues agement teams, other intact or cross-functional work
teams, or to individuals gathered from different parts of
• 10 - 20 times higher levels of employee engagement an organization.
• 3 - 4 times reduction in employees thinking about
quitting MINDING THE GAP AND FIXING
• 50% fewer employees that do leave WEAKNESSES
• Double the satisfaction with pay and job security Traditional assessments and needs analysis look for
gaps. And most 360 feedback tools focus on finding
• 4 - 5 times more employees “willing to go the extra and fixing weaknesses. This often leads to:
mile.”
• Participants feeling beat up by feedback reports.
• 1.5 times higher customer satisfaction ratings
• Negative response or avoidance of 360 multi-rater
• Over 3 times safer work environment
feedback tools.
What’s especially remarkable is how obtainable extra-
• Erosion of confidence.
ordinary leadership is proving to be. A leader needs to
develop just three existing strengths out of sixteen com- • Defensiveness and fear of making mistakes.
petencies to catapult his or her leadership effectiveness • Data denial and feedback phobia.
from the 34th to the 80th percentile!
• Working on a weak area and only getting it to
average - with mediocre results.
• A belief that extraordinary leadership is achieved
by naturally gifted or “born leaders.”
Zenger Folkman’s deep research shows very clearly that
it’s the presence of strengths - not the absence of weak-
nesses - that defines highly effective leaders. Build-
ing strengths is proving to be the only way to move
from an average or ordinary leader to extraordinary
or exceptional.
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2. ZENGER FOLKMAN’S STRENGTHS-BASED THE EXTRAORDINARY LEADER PROCESS
LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT SYSTEM IS A AND PARTICIPANT OUTCOMES
REVOLUTION. This is a uniquely powerful leadership development sys-
The research and approaches used in this system were tem using strengths-based leadership development, on
first outlined in Zenger Folkman's bestselling book The a foundation of evidence-based approaches, produc-
Extraordinary Leader: Turning Good Managers into Great ing a highly personalized development plan, that’s built
Leaders and the Harvard Business Review article “Mak- around a best of class 360 multi-rater tool.
ing Yourself Indispensable.” Their newest book, How to • Learn the sixteen empirically identified key
Be Exceptional: Drive Leadership Success by Magnifying leadership competencies in five clusters that cause
Your Strengths further updates that work. leaders and their team/organizations to flounder or
In a series of pre and post studies Zenger Folkman flourish.
looked at the impact of leaders choosing to fix weak- • Understand the significant on-the-job performance
nesses versus building on existing strengths. Twelve to differences between “good” and “extraordinary”
18 months later the leaders who magnified their existing leaders and the dramatic impact on his or her team/
strengths showed two - three times more improvement organization.
in leadership effectiveness than leaders who worked on
fixing their weaknesses. • Why building on existing strengths is up to 3 times
more effective than fixing weaknesses.
Why Strengths-based Leadership Development Works
Better: • When to work on weaknesses.
• Building strengths is the only way to become an • Understand and cut through the complex interplay
extraordinary leader. of strengths, weaknesses, and performance.
• A strengths focus produces up to three times • Prepare to receive an individual 360 multi-rater
higher change and improvement. leadership feedback report, understand the report
structure, interpret the data, and learn how to use it
• Profits, sales, engagement, morale, and energy in a positive way for growth and development.
levels, turnover, health and safety, and customer
satisfaction skyrockets. • Perform a step-by-step analysis of the personal
feedback report using a structured process with
• The spectrum of development methods broadens individual and group exercises.
with cross-training and Companion Competencies.
• Aligning and multiplying his or her unique strengths
• Participant motivation to improve is much higher. and passion for improvement with the organization’s
• Organizational culture is much more positive and needs.
energized. • Research-based strength development using
• It’s a lot more fun to work on strengths! Companion Competencies, cross-training, and
non-linear approaches to build an Individual
Development Plan.
• Identifying THE key competency for development
that will drive each participant’s broadest
improvement for his or her personal situation.
• Coaching, implementation follow through, and the
support processes/tools to make learning stick.
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3. PARTICIPANT MATERIALS
• The online Extraordinary Leader multi-rater (360)
assessment and personal feedback report.
• The Extraordinary Leader Participant Manual
and unique, cross-training development tool, the
Competency Companion Development Guide.
• A hard copy of How to Be Exceptional: Drive
Leadership Success by Magnifying Your Strengths
by Jack Zenger, Joe Folkman, Bob Sherwin, and
Barbara Steel (McGraw Hill 2012). NEW CANADIAN STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIP
IN-HOUSE CUSTOMIZATION The CLEMMER Group is Zenger Folkman’s new Canadian
strategic partner. Zenger Folkman is pioneering ground-
The Extraordinary Leader Workshop, materials, and 360 breaking new strengths-based leadership research, as-
assessment can easily be customized to: sessment, development, and sustainable implemen-
• Be tailored to an organization’s existing competency tation systems. They’ve built unique evidence-driven
model. approaches for developing extraordinary leaders and
empirically showing their performance impact on sales,
• Provide flexible delivery options, including profits, employee engagement, health and safety, turn-
individualized coaching, etc. over, and customer satisfaction. Jim Clemmer and Jack
• Link to organizational culture development efforts. Zenger’s training and consulting firms first partnered
when they led The Achieve Group and Zenger Miller. It’s
a well developed and highly proven system that produc-
es extraordinary results.
Contact us to discuss bringing this powerful workshop to your organization.
Phone: (519) 748-1044
Web: www.clemmergroup.com
E-mail: service@clemmer.net
THE CLEMMER GROUP
10 PIONEER DRIVE, SUITE 105
KITCHENER, ON N2P 2A4
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4. CLIENT REVIEWS
“At Boeing’s Aerospace Support division, we had con- “The Extraordinary Leader research caused us to
cerns about our level of employee commitment. Our rethink our performance management philosophy. We
work with the Extraordinary Leader introduced us to the revamped our process to orient it more toward building
research showing a connection between leadership ef- employees’ strengths. The results have been remarkable.
fectiveness and employee commitment. Partnering with We now have a more balanced performance agreement,
Zenger Folkman, we created a competency model, an highlighting areas of strength, and significant problems
on-line multi-rater feedback process, and a workshop to that must be fixed. The biggest change has been in the
help our leaders develop their strengths. Using the ‘cross energy people have for the performance management
training’ approach; our leaders achieved an across-the- process. It is now something that most employees look
board improvement of close to 15% in their year-over- forward to. How many companies can say that?”
year employee commitment scores. Not only did our
– Mary Settle, Vice President of Human Resources,
best leaders get better, but our ‘average’ leaders and
BARD Access Systems
even our poorest leaders showed marked improvement
in their leadership effectiveness and employee commit-
ment scores. This improvement was a critical factor in
our qualifications for the Malcolm Baldrige award, which
our division won.”
– Dee Thomas, HR Director, Boeing Aerospace “…the path to greatness is really about building profound
Support strengths, rather than through relentlessly focusing on
one’s weaknesses."
– Michael A. Peel, Yale University, Vice President,
Human Resources and Administration
“The workshop was excellent and feedback from all par-
ticipants has been extremely positive. I particularly en-
joyed the way current paradigms on developing leaders
were challenged. I have no doubt that those who attend-
“Zenger Folkman’s research and tools have provided
ed will benefit from the experience and will, in turn, pro-
excellent guidance to leaders I’ve worked with over
vide benefits for our organization.”
the years. The tools allowed them to create actionable
– J. Mateparae, Master General, New Zealand Defense goals and inspired them to actively pursue excellence in
Force leadership.”
– Pam Mabry, Director, Human Resources, The Boeing
Company
“The Extraordinary Leader class was one of the most
powerful and insightful programs I have ever attended.
The 360-degree profile gave me deep insights into how
“The Zenger Folkman organization has had a profound
others perceive me as a leader, and the course and
effect on leadership development. Their research reveals
follow-on coaching has paved an exciting path for me to
the impact of strengths-based development on individ-
follow in developing my leadership skills.”
ual and organization success across industries and ge-
– Ricardo Fuchs, Vice President, Serv Corp, Inc. ographies. Their competency model and 360 evaluation
provide the framework around which to build a develop-
ment plan.”
– Hillery Ballantyne, Senior Vice President, Talent
Management and Leadership Development, Elsevier
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