What are the leadership skills and courses that an employee needs to become a future leader?
The Top Leadership Skills and Courses section of LinkedIn Learning lists the top 15 courses that leaders with higher positions took to help them adapt to the changing nature of the workplace and help their teams do the same.
Today’s leaders spend time on LinkedIn Learning exploring subjects like:
- Expanding from a managerial role to a leadership role
- Strengthening communication practices
- Giving, receiving, and actioning feedback
- Enhancing soft skills for better coaching and personal rapport
Focus on Today’s Top Leadership Skills and Courses
To help leaders update and grow these invaluable skills, check out the most popular leadership skills and courses to sharpen your management, communication, empowerment, and listening skills. And be ready to leverage the leadership opportunities in this new world of work.
Without further ado, here’s the list:
1. Executive Presence on Video Conference Calls with Jessica Chen
2. How to Make Strategic Thinking a Habit with Dorie Clark
3. Guy Kawasaki on Turning Life Wisdom into a Business with Guy Kawasaki
4. Coaching Skills for Leaders and Managers with Sara Canaday
5. Skills for Inclusive Conversations with Mary-Frances Winters
6. Executive Leadership with John Ullmen
7. Building Resilience as a Leader with Gemma Leigh Roberts
8. Coaching and Developing Employees with Lisa Gates
9. Communicating the Language of Leadership with Pete Mockaltis
10. Transitioning from Manager to Leader with Sara Canaday
11. Leadership Mindsets with Sesil Pir
12. How to Give Feedback to Senior Colleagues with Aimee Bateman
13. Giving and Receiving Feedback with Gemma Leigh Roberts
14. How to Work Smarter, Not Harder: Save Time and Money and Increase Productivity with Chelsea Krost
15. Starting a Memorable Conversation with Tatiana Kolovou
Learn more about key takeaways from these courses and the skills they’ll help you cultivate.
Leadership Communication Skills in the Workplace
The sheer volume of communication-focused topics among our top leadership skills and courses for business leaders shows that many are eager to modernize their communication skills. Learning how to incorporate inclusive language, navigate power dynamics, and handle (as well as give) sensitive feedback are notable qualities in demand by leaders and organizations alike.
Skills for Inclusive Conversations with Mary-Frances Winters
What You’ll Learn: For years conversations around race, religion, politics and anything else that relates to identity in the workplace have been widely considered to be taboo. But the fact is, that diverse teams are more productive, innovative, and engaged. And growing research around psychological safety, engagement, and inclusion has shifted from “if” we should discuss these issues to “how” to have more meaningful, inclusive conversations. In this course, Winters discusses self-assessment to better understand yourself and your team, tactics to go from polarization to common ground, and six key steps to fostering inclusive conversations.
Communicating in the Language of Leadership with Pete Mockaitis
What You’ll Learn: Motivating and inspiring others requires more than just talking. True communication as a leader is built on key listening skills to achieve connection and lasting results. This course with Mockaitis is adapted from the podcast How to Be Awesome at Your Job, where communications expert Chris Westfall shares tips for harnessing three key types of listening, crafting “you” language, and phrasing your goals in terms of impact on others to engage them on a more effective, personal level.
How to Give Negative Feedback to Senior Colleagues with Aimee Bateman
What You’ll Learn: Providing negative feedback up the chain to anyone in a more senior position can be a nerve-racking proposition. This course created by Careercake’s CEO and founder provides tips and tools to help make yourself more comfortable, confident, and effective in your delivery. Learn why giving feedback within 48 hours after experiencing an instance that requires a conversation is best. Know what to ask if your superior requests feedback. And get insights on how to plan your conversation — and deliver your message — for the greatest impact and most positive results.
Giving and Receiving Feedback with Gemma Leigh Roberts
What You’ll Learn: Regardless of the position you’re in, and how the power dynamics stack up, understanding how to give and receive feedback is a critical tool for advancing any career. Learn tips on how to uncover your development “blind spots” to better understand how others perceive you, and how to create a growth mindset that propels your career — and relationships — forward.
Starting a Memorable Conversation with Tatiana Kolovou
What You’ll Learn: Sometimes the key to opening new doors means becoming more effective at striking up a conversation. Of course, like any other business skill, being the first person to speak takes practice, practice, practice. You’ll want to open any dialogue respectfully and in a relevant way that can build your credibility and generate momentum. Kolovou shares formulas for starting meaningful conversations in any situation (even online), overcoming some common pitfalls and sharpening communication and rapport-building skills — including how to approach a CEO at a company event.
Building an Executive Skill Set
Prepare yourself to take on new roles — and the challenges tied to tackling a bigger scope of work and responsibilities that come with them. In this set of courses, developing leaders can learn how to make the transition from manager to the company leader, discover the keys to success in the C-suite, and understand the importance of maintaining a service mentality as you move up. Climbing the ladder means continually adding and sharpening skills to excel with new duties, and skillfully setting a vision to meet demands that are significantly greater than before.
Executive Presence on Video Conference Calls with Jessica Chen
What You’ll Learn: Put your best self forward to look and sound confident, collected, and smarter on your next video call or presentation. In this course featured in Market Watch, Fortune, Forbes, and Entrepreneur, communication consultant Chen provides expert advice on introducing yourself and speaking up, how to contribute to the call, and using visuals like PowerPoint to support your content. Learn easy ways to perfect eye contact depending on different factors, how to use effective hand gestures and technical insights like where to position your camera for the most flattering and engaging look.
Executive Leadership with John Ullmen
What You’ll Learn: Earning trust with colleagues, employees, and clients is a cornerstone of successful executive leadership, built on key principles — reliability, credibility, and connection — that you can incorporate into everyday interactions. Follow along with author John Ullmen, PhD, as he walks you through four helpful disciplines every leader can use. For example, learning how to set a direction that creates a compelling vision for the future, motivating commitment that energizes and empowers others, and prioritizing key results. You’ll gain tools to develop yourself with resilience, while proactively building robust relationships for a “multiplier effect.”
Transitioning from Manager to Leader with Sara Canaday
What You’ll Learn: These days in business, the terms manager and leader are often used interchangeably. But more than managers, leaders are tasked with coaching and mentoring. They set strategic vision — they don’t tell, they sell. Leadership is not just about overseeing others, but making them more successful. Executive coach Canaday shares proven strategies to help shift your mindset from manager to leader by channeling personal growth through self awareness, and developing the kind of image and demeanor that instantly communicates leadership. You’ll learn how to expand your strategic scope, adopt an innovative spirit to think in the future tense, and improve your decision making skills. What’s more, you’ll get insights on how to attract and nurture top talent, and help employees strengthen their skills in a way that benefits both them and the business.
Developing a Leadership Mindset and Workflow
With so much on their plates day in and day out, modern leaders must develop good habits, mentalities, and productivity practices to stay on track. These courses provide tools and tips for changing your mindset to evolve leadership abilities, strengthen resilience, and become more effective at orchestrating your own workflow — as well as those of others — to drive success and efficiency.
How to Make Strategic Thinking a Habit with Dorie Clark
What You’ll Learn: In a recent study, 96% of leaders said they didn’t “have time” for strategic thinking. While that disconnect sounds staggering, in reality it’s an opportunity for you to create a competitive advantage in the marketplace. Join Clark for insights on how to train yourself to get into better habits that make strategic thinking a part of your every day. Find tips on small adjustments you can make to spark strategic thought, like recording conversations and taking notes by hand. Discover why changing your to-do list to a “to-focus-on” list can help shift your attention in a positive direction. And uncover tactics for gleaning valuable insights from past decisions to ask yourself the right questions to stay on task and on track.
Guy Kawasaki on Turning Life Wisdom into Business Success
What You’ll Learn: According to Guy Kawasaki, one of the world’s leading corporate evangelists and author of Wise Guy, leveraging your own grit and determination can help make you a more intuitive and successful leader. In this course created by genConnectU, Kawasakitalks about how he built his career, and why some of the riskiest moves he made at Apple — disparaging a potential partner and trading jabs with Steve Jobs — paid off. In total, he covers everything from moral values and the five stages of life to business skills and parenting. As he writes, “I hope my stories help you live a more joyous, productive, and meaningful life. If Wise Guy succeeds at this, then that’s the best story of all.”
Building Resilience as a Leader with Gemma Leigh Roberts
What You’ll Learn: As a leader today, juggling the significant number of priorities you’re asked to account for is a tall task, but it comes with the territory. Things like everyday performance, measuring results, achieving goals, and boosting bottom lines — on top of guiding teams to grow and succeed — require resilience that can help you survive and thrive in challenging times. In this course, Roberts offers approachable and actionable tips to develop a resilient mindset, a resilient team, and a resilient organization that is prepared to take on risk and change.
Leadership Mindsets with Sesil Pir
What You’ll Learn: No two leaders are created the same — each coming into their role with different aptitudes, capabilities, and experiences that shape how they approach each challenge. Depending on the type of mindset you possess, it’s possible to demonstrate a different set of leadership styles that can create the kind of positive working environment others respond to. In this short course, organizational psychologist Pir shares how frames of reference impact relationships and outcomes. Successful leaders adapt their thought patterns to develop a caring mindset to improve and inspire employee engagement. She provides pointers for focusing on the well-being of employees to connect on a meaningful level.
How to Work Smarter, Not Harder: Save Time and Money and Increase Productivity with Chelsea Krost
What You’ll Learn: The cornerstone of working smarter, not harder, is understanding how to maximize the hours in your day. It’s part mindset, part technology, and all desire to thrive in this new era of work. Whether you’re growing a business or working to advance your career, Krost provides tangible, tested tips to increase productivity, efficiency, and success. Learn things like how to better leverage automation tools such as Google Drive, Microsoft Office, Dropbox, or Trello to collaborate and create. Find insights on how to power up and streamline your social media strategy, and discover six best practices for LinkedIn to continue growing your brand.
How to Train and Coach Employees
The skill of coaching in athletics is a highly valued one that can shape and create a winning mentality. Yet in the workplace it’s an often overlooked aspect of the job. Finding your niche in training and coaching employees can make you an indispensable member of your organization — and separate you from the rest of the crowd in your field. What’s more, it can also be one of the most rewarding aspects of your role as a leader as well. With these courses, you’ll find guidance on helping your teams improve, develop, and win.
Coaching Skills for Leaders and Managers with Sara Canaday
What You’ll Learn: Building talent has become an essential leadership quality that can help organizations grow exponentially — and that’s why every company can benefit from adopting a coaching culture. Learn from Canaday as she covers the distinctly different approaches needed for helping employees acquire the skills they need to perform their jobs (training), providing high-level support and advice based on past experiences (mentoring), and helping others reach full potential to prepare for success (coaching). You’ll discover proven coaching models and skills to support development and growth, common coaching challenges, and the business case for coaching.
Coaching and Developing Employees with Lisa Gates
What you will learn: According to Gallup, only 15% of employees are truly engaged in their work. That means a significant number of people are actively disengaged, and likely costing their organization in lost productivity. So how do leaders navigate employee engagement and development? Join leadership and negotiation coach Lisa Gates as she offers tips on three types of coaching conversations. Discover assessments, exercises, and tools to help your team surpass goals and accelerate growth. Learn how shifting from a command-and-control style of management to a manager-as-coach style of leadership can transform engagement and bottom-line results. You’ll acquire the right questions to ask, tips for becoming an active listener, and ways to establish a valuable coaching relationship with employees.
Acquire Skills to Take the Lead in a New Era of Business
In our current fast-changing times, leadership skills like empathy, communication, coaching, and creating a supportive environment (to name a few) have become anything but “soft.” They’re indispensable qualities that can positively shape employee engagement, drive tangible results, and accelerate careers.