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4: If Your Leaders Aren’t Uncomfortable, They’re Not Growing | Wes Anderson
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Are your leadership programs creating better leaders or just checking boxes?
In this illuminating episode of The Learnit Lounge podcast, host Mickey Fitch-Collins sits down with Wes Anderson from Ball Horticultural to tackle the uncomfortable truth about why many leadership development initiatives fail to deliver real results. Discover how to move beyond rigid frameworks and create space for leaders to experiment, make mistakes, and truly grow in the flow of their daily work.
This Learnit Lounge conversation explores why traditional training approaches often miss the mark when applied to leadership development and offers practical insights on crafting programs that create meaningful transformation rather than just ticking administrative boxes. Wes shares his philosophy of "shaking the box" to create productive discomfort that enables real learning and challenges L&D professionals to focus less on metrics and more on creating the conditions where leadership can naturally emerge.
This Episode Covers:
- Why leadership development differs fundamentally from skills training and requires space for experimentation
- How focusing too much on frameworks and models can overshadow the actual leadership growth
- The danger of leadership programs becoming self-sustaining administrative processes rather than tools for transformation
- How to avoid the trap of giving answers instead of empowering leaders to find their own solutions
- The myth that we fully understand leadership development despite centuries of human leadership experience
Timestamped Highlights:
00:00 – Welcome to the Lounge: Mickey introduces Wes Anderson and tees up the conversation on building leadership programs that actually work
01:57 – “Shaking the box”: Why discomfort is a prerequisite for real learning
03:54 – Is leadership development a myth?
06:30 – The ROI trap: Why measurable outcomes don’t always mean meaningful impact
08:00 – Conferences vs. real life: Learning in context vs. learning in isolation
09:30 – Tolerance, deviation, and jammed gears
11:00 – Why real leadership development requires room for mistakes
13:00 – Budgeting for leadership: Defects, downtime, and uncomfortable learning curves
14:30 – Human margin of error
15:30 – Models are tools, not destinations: The danger of falling in love with frameworks
17:00 – People vs. process: Why all leadership is ultimately human
18:00 – Four cardinal truths of good leadership development
22:45 – “Check the box” syndrome: How structure can undermine substance
24:15 – When programs run on autopilot: Are you leading—or just administering?
26:50 – Pressure reveals leadership
27:30 – Most significant leadership lesson: Don’t give answers—give breadcrumbs
30:25 – The uncomfortable truth: We still don’t really know how to “develop” leaders
31:45 – Final takeaway #1: Create space for failure—because that’s where leaders grow
32:10 – Final takeaway #2: Embrace new ideas as tools—not solutions
33:15 – How to connect with Wes: Continue the conversation on LinkedIn
About Wes:
Wes Anderson leads professional and leadership development at Ball Horticultural Company in West Chicago, Illinois. With a diverse background spanning private industry and military service, he brings a unique operational perspective to learning and development. His approach centers on "shaking the box" to encourage new perspectives while creating space for experimentation and growth. A graduate from Northern Illinois University College of Law and University of Illinois alumnus, Wes has built his career through roles at Flex, Motorola Solutions, and General Mills.
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