Oscar Wilde said, "Nothing that is worth knowing can be taught."

Leadership is like that, too. Leaders learn the most from their experiences, not from the classes they take or the workshops they attend. That is, they don't learn leadership skills in a course nearly as much as they learn them on the job.

Several years ago, I was talking with a client, the CEO and founder of a successful small business, who commented on a recent week-long program he had attended at his alma mater, one of the most prestigious business schools in the U.S. He said, "I was very disappointed. I had expected to learn how to run my business better, but we spent most of our time working on case studies that just weren't relevant to me. They were often about global companies, far larger than mine, and these companies were facing issues that were not like what I have to deal with. It just wasn't useful."

I find that a lot. So many of the programs I've seen aren't relevant and don't help leaders deal with the actual situations they face. What they try to teach doesn't work, for a variety of reasons, among them:

· The courses are heavily laden with theories, models, and methodologies, which may be of interest to academics and scholars, but have little practical value to business leaders.

· The courses are dominated by lectures and presentations, which serve mostly to sap the energy of the participants, who want to sink their teeth into something meaty and meaningful.

The solution to making courses on leadership relevant and practical is to follow a few guidelines:

· Weight the programs heavily toward participation and interaction. Most of the time (75% or more), the participants should be actively doing something, rather than listening to someone else talk.

· Focus on real, work-related problems. This takes a bit of homework, but it's worth it in the long-term, since the participants will be working on real issues they can resolve when they go back to work.

· Provide simple, basic skills and strategies that are readily understood and used. Leadership approaches should not be made overly complex or they won't be useful.

The solution for impractical and irrelevant courses requires a shift in thinking that transforms the classroom from a place where participants sit quietly and listen, to a dynamic, engaged environment where real issues and problems are worked on and resolved.

As I mentioned above, most learning for leaders takes place on the job, not in the classroom. How do leaders use their experiences wisely and become better as a result? Two suggestions can help:

· First, realize that everything is a test. Leaders are put to the test every hour of every day. If you want to get better, use those tests as a means of getting better.

Like great athletes, superstar performers, and world-class chefs, set yourself clear and specific measures of success and then evaluate yourself on whether you met the standard you set for yourself. If you achieved the goal, what enabled you to do so? And if not, what do you need to do differently the next time?

· Second, evaluate yourself mercilessly. Don't let yourself be deceived by wishful thinking or obsequious colleagues - develop the ability to look at yourself honestly and to generate and listen to candid feedback from others.

Many of the very best leaders have a few select friends and colleagues they rely on to give them sound feedback. They don't ever allow themselves to be seduced into thinking that they know all the answers or have nothing left to learn.

Leaders can and do learn to lead. But to do so, they cannot fall into the trap of thinking that their learning is passive, or managed and orchestrated by someone else. They have to take charge of their own learning. What steps can you take to help yourself and others learn to become better leaders?

As Henry Ford suggested, "Failure is the opportunity to begin again, more intelligently."

So many leaders have learned from their failures, grown, and become better for it.

In what ways have you become more intelligent as a result of your failures?

Carl Sagan said, "It is far better to grasp the universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring."

And yet, many leaders persist in deluding themselves into thinking that the reality of their situation is what they want it to be, not what it is.

Are there satisfying and reassuring aspects of your situation that need to be questioned so that you can grasp reality as it is? If so, what are they?

Email archie@archietinelli.com