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10 Presentation Ideas For Leadership Teams and Training

Leadership teams shape organizations for better or for worse. They’re responsible for guiding teams and moving things— big or small— forward. So what makes a great leader versus one that causes employees to leave a company?

When you think of a great leader, it’s probably a specific characteristic that comes to mind. Qualities like respect, self-awareness, trust, influence, collaboration, and strong communication skills can set extraordinary managers apart from mediocre ones. But how leaders listen, learn, and communicate with their employees is just as important. Because of that, leaders— regardless of the industry— need to hold themselves accountable and continuously seek out ways to grow as a manager.   

It’s not uncommon for companies to host offsites or retreats to bring the leadership team together for brainstorming, planning, and training. This helps align leaders across various departments, teams, and offices, while offering them the tools they need to be more successful in their role. 

When preparing a presentation for leadership teams and training, it's crucial to focus on content that resonates with the audience's strategic mindset and their role in guiding the organization. Here are some leadership presentation ideas to help inspire your own content.

Leadership presentation ideas

Presentations can act as a platform to encourage learning and collaboration among different leaders. Do you have a leadership retreat coming up? Here are 10 leadership presentation ideas to help train and motivate your own leadership team. 

Effective leadership strategies

As a recurring training, you might share effective leadership strategies with your executive team. This presentation would act as a refresher of the latest trends and best practices in leadership. This could include insights on empathetic leadership, fostering a positive company culture, and embracing diversity and inclusion.

Change management

How should managers and leadership teams address the challenges and opportunities associated with change within the organization? A change management presentation would provide strategies for how leaders can navigate transitions successfully, with the least amount of disruption to the team.

Strategic planning and decision-making

A strategic planning and decision making presentation will offer insights into the process of setting achievable goals and making informed decisions. Organizations might also use a strategic planning presentation to lead their own company brainstorming sessions at a leadership all-hands meeting. 

Team development and engagement

Team development and engagement is important for the overall success of the team. In this presentation you might share techniques for fostering a high-performing and engaged team, including methods for providing feedback, coaching, and creating a supportive work environment.

Communication skills

Communication skills can make or break a leader. A training session on effective communication in leadership roles could be beneficial for both managers and executives of all levels. Here you could offer practical tips for clear, transparent, and empowering communication.

Leading through uncertainty

Given the current business landscape and layoffs happening across various industries, leadership teams need to know how to handle hard situations. This presentation idea for leadership teams would discuss strategies for navigating uncertainty and ambiguity, including how to maintain resilience and inspire confidence in a team concerned about job security. 

Embracing innovation and creativity

It’s no secret that AI is here to stay, and teams are having to pivot to accommodate new technology. Use a thoughtful presentation to encourage leaders to embrace innovation and promote a culture of creativity within the organization. The slides in this deck could showcase the benefits of adopting innovative approaches and thinking outside the box.

Building high-performance teams

Leaders need the right tools and knowledge to be able to guide positive performance. Employers might offer a training “how-to” on best practices for assembling and nurturing high-performance teams. This deck should include strategies for fostering collaboration, trust, and accountability among teammates. 

Data-driven decision making

As a leader, leveraging data to make more informed decisions should be top of mind. This leadership presentation idea can highlight the importance of leveraging data and analytics in decision-making processes, and offer guidance on how to incorporate data-driven insights into leadership strategies. This could include ways to implement KPIs, OKRs, or other effective ways to track the performance of individual contributors and campaigns. 

Ethical leadership

A wildly important leadership topic is ethics. Upper management should be well-educated in ethical leadership, and how that impacts the success of the team. An ethical leadership presentation could include the significance of ethics, the impact it has on organizational culture, employee morale, and long-term success, and how to ensure it’s top of mind in each department on a daily basis.

Beautiful presentations to drive your message home

You have a presentation topic, now what? The hardest part of presentation design is going from idea to deck with little design skills to back you up. Thankfully, there's a presentation software for that. Insert: Beautiful.ai. Beautiful.ai helps leadership teams create beautiful presentations so they can pack a bigger punch with their message and inspire their audience. Presenters can use one of Beautiful.ai's customizable pre-built presentation templates — like the training presentation — or leverage our AI-assistant to create a presentation from scratch specific to their topic. By creating beautiful decks you can engage your audience, drive your message home, and leave your leadership team feeling inspired to make a difference.

Jordan Turner

Jordan is a Bay Area writer, social media manager, and content strategist.

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7 brilliant ways successful leaders start presentations

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“The beginning is the most important part of the work.” —Plato

When we speak, we have about 60 seconds to capture our audience’s attention, establish credibility, orient them to our topic, and motivate them to listen, says Darlene Price, president of Well Said, Inc., and author of “Well Said! Presentations and Conversations That Get Results.”

If you waste those precious opening seconds with a joke, an agenda, an apology, housekeeping details, a string of thank-yous, or a rambling, pointless paragraph littered with “ums” and “uhs,” your audience’s minds are likely to drift, and you may not get them back. “You need to put the art in the start, the most important part of the work,” says Price.

That’s a tall order for any speaker — and it requires us to develop and rehearse a well-crafted, attention-getting opener.

Price offers seven options:

1. Tell a captivating story.

“Of all the starters in your toolkit, storytelling is among the most powerful and consistently successful,” Price says. “As humans, we’re hard-wired to enjoy and learn from stories. From bedtime stories and campfires, to Broadway theaters and boardrooms — heroes, villains, conflict, plots, dialogue, and lessons learned draw us in, remind us of our own lives, and hold our attention.”

The story can be about you personally, which tells the audience first-hand why you’re invested in and passionate about the topic. Or you can tell a story about another person who the audience can learn from. “Another option: Tell a fable, wisdom tale, historic event, or anecdote,” Price says. “The idea is, start with a brief 60- to 90-second narrative that launches your speech and captivates your listeners, and make sure the story encapsulates the key point of your message.”

She suggests you consider these questions as you craft your version of “Once upon a time”: What challenges have you (or another) faced in relation to your topic? How did you (or another) overcome them? Who or what helped you or harmed you? What lessons were learned? What do you want your audience to gain, feel, or do as a result of the story?

2. Ask a rhetorical, thought-provoking question.

“As Shakespeare wrote in ‘The Merchant of Venice,’ ‘If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?'” says Price. “As a speaker, you ask rhetorical questions for persuasive effect; you don’t expect the audience to answer aloud, rather silently to themselves.

When crafted and delivered well, rhetorical questions influence an audience to believe in the position of the speaker. “Clearly, Shakespeare’s character Shylock is leading his listeners to think ‘yes’ four times in order to justify revenge against Antonio. What do you want your audience to say ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to?”

In addition to yes or no questions, you can also arouse curiosity and motivate your audience to think about the answer, she says.

3. State a shocking statistic or headline.

Price says the vice president of sales for America’s leading healthcare IT company successfully sells software solutions to hospitals by starting her presentations with the following:

“According to a new study in the Journal of Patient Safety, medical errors leading to patient death are much higher than previously thought. Preventable adverse events, known as PAEs, cause up to 400,000 deaths per year for patients who seek care at a hospital. That means medical errors are the third leading cause of death behind heart disease and cancer. Our vision is to create a world free of medical errors, and we need your help.”

“The statistic, bold claim, or headline needs to be directly related to the main purpose of your presentation,” Price explains. “Its impact ideally persuades the audience to listen and respond positively to your recommendation and next steps.”

4. Use a powerful quote.

“Employ the wise words of a well-known person, because the name allows you to tap into his or her credibility, likeability, and notoriety,” she says. The quote must have meaning and relevance to the audience.

Imagine you’re urging a group to reach consensus, or giving a talk on conflict management. You could open with: “Mark Twain once said, ‘If two people agree on everything, one of them is unnecessary.’ Even though some of us disagree on the xyz issue, each of us is necessary in reaching a resolution.”

5. Show a gripping photo.

A picture is worth a thousand words — “maybe even more,” Price says.

“Use photos instead of text, when possible,” she suggests. A quality photo adds aesthetic appeal, increases comprehension, engages the audience’s imagination, and makes the message more memorable.

Price offers the following example of an effective use of an image:

The president of an electronics equipment company needed his managers to cut costs. Rather than showing mundane charts, graphs, and spreadsheets, he opened the meeting by asking, “What sank the Titanic?” When everyone in unison replied, “an iceberg,” he displayed a beautiful high-definition image of an iceberg on the screen: the tip of the iceberg was clearly visible above the water; the much larger portion was dimly visible below the surface of the water.

“The same thing is about to happen to our company,” he continued. “Hidden costs — the dangers beneath the surface — are about to sink this company. I need your help.” This visual metaphor spawned a creative, productive brainstorming session that inspired every business unit manager to diligently hunt for what they labeled the “icebergs,” says Price. The result was saving millions and ultimately the company.

6. Use a prop or creative visual aid.

“A prop is a magnetic tool that hooks your audience and keeps them watching — or listening,” Price says. A visual aid can also help emphasize a point.

Price uses the example of a sales VP at a large insurance company, who happens to be an avid tennis player. She says he wanted to kick off his annual meeting with a bang — so he “brilliantly used his tennis racquet to emphasize ‘acing the competition,’ ‘rallying together as a team,’ and winning a ‘grand slam’ through great customer service.” Year after year, other speakers were compared to this leader’s creative ability to present a motivational message, she says.

“Think about how you could use items like a big wall clock, a colorful gift bag, juggling balls, a deck of cards, a bunch of carrots, or another prop, to introduce your topic, captivate the audience, inject humor, and drive home your message.”

7. Play a short video.

Imagine kicking off a product management meeting with a video of compelling customer testimonials, or opening a fundraising event for endangered species by showing an Amur Leopard playing with her cubs in the wild.

“Videos evoke emotional responses,” Price explains. “Unlike text and bullet points on a slide, you can employ people, pictures, and sound to reel in the audience, add drama, and communicate the gist of your message quickly.”

As Walt Disney said, “I would rather entertain and hope that people learned something than educate people and hope they were entertained.”

This article is published in collaboration with Business Insider . Publication does not imply endorsement of views by the World Economic Forum.

To keep up with the Agenda  subscribe to our weekly newsletter .

Author: Jacquelyn Smith joined Business Insider as the careers editor in February 2014.

Image: an empty meeting room is shown. REUTERS.

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What is leadership?

All leaders, to a certain degree, do the same thing. Whether you’re talking about an executive, manager, sports coach, or schoolteacher, leadership is about guiding and impacting outcomes, enabling groups of people to work together to accomplish what they couldn’t do working individually. In this sense, leadership is something you do, not something you are. Some people in formal leadership positions are poor leaders, and many people exercising leadership have no formal authority. It is their actions, not their words, that inspire trust and energy.

Get to know and directly engage with senior McKinsey experts on leadership

Aaron De Smet is a senior partner in McKinsey’s New Jersey office, Carolyn Dewar is a senior partner in the Bay Area office, Scott Keller is a senior partner in the Southern California office, and Vik Malhotra and Ramesh Srinivasan are senior partners in the New York office.

What’s more, leadership is not something people are born with—it is a skill you can learn. At the core are mindsets, which are expressed through observable behaviors , which then lead to measurable outcomes. Is a leader communicating effectively or engaging others by being a good listener? Focusing on behaviors lets us be more objective when assessing leadership effectiveness. The key to unlocking shifts in behavior is focusing on mindsets, becoming more conscious about our thoughts and beliefs, and showing up with integrity as our full authentic selves.

There are many contexts and ways in which leadership is exercised. But, according to McKinsey analysis of academic literature as well as a survey of nearly 200,000 people in 81 organizations all over the world, there are four types of behavior that account for 89 percent of leadership effectiveness :

• being supportive
• operating with a strong results orientation
• seeking different perspectives
• solving problems effectively

Effective leaders know that what works in one situation will not necessarily work every time. Leadership strategies must reflect each organization’s context and stage of evolution. One important lens is organizational health, a holistic set of factors that enable organizations to grow and succeed over time. A situational approach  enables leaders to focus on the behaviors that are most relevant as an organization becomes healthier.

Senior leaders must develop a broad range of skills to guide organizations. Ten timeless topics are important for leading nearly any organization, from attracting and retaining talent  to making culture a competitive advantage. A 2017 McKinsey book, Leading Organizations: Ten Timeless Truths (Bloomsbury, 2017), goes deep on each aspect.

How is leadership evolving?

In the past, leadership was called “management,” with an emphasis on providing technical expertise and direction. The context was the traditional industrial economy command-and-control organization, where leaders focused exclusively on maximizing value for shareholders. In these organizations, leaders had three roles: planners (who develop strategy, then translate that strategy into concrete steps), directors (who assign responsibilities), or controllers (who ensure people do what they’ve been assigned and plans are adhered to).

What are the limits of traditional management styles?

Traditional management was revolutionary in its day and enormously effective in building large-scale global enterprises that have materially improved lives over the past 200 years. However, with the advent of the 21st century, this approach is reaching its limits.

For one thing, this approach doesn’t guarantee happy or loyal managers or workers. Indeed, a large portion of American workers—56 percent— claim their boss is mildly or highly toxic , while 75 percent say dealing with their manager is the most stressful part of their workday.

For 21st-century organizations operating in today’s complex business environment, a fundamentally new and more effective approach to leadership is emerging. Leaders today are beginning to focus on building agile, human-centered, and digitally enabled organizations able to thrive in today’s unprecedented environment and meet the needs of a broader range of stakeholders (customers, employees, suppliers, and communities, in addition to investors).

What is the emerging new approach to leadership?

This new approach to leadership is sometimes described as “ servant leadership .” While there has been some criticism of the nomenclature, the idea itself is simple: rather than being a manager directing and controlling people, a more effective approach is for leaders to be in service of the people they lead. The focus is on how leaders can make the lives of their team members easier—physically, cognitively, and emotionally. Research suggests this mentality can enhance both team performance and satisfaction.

In this new approach, leaders practice empathy, compassion, vulnerability, gratitude, self-awareness, and self-care. They provide appreciation and support, creating psychological safety so their employees are able to collaborate, innovate, and raise issues as appropriate. This includes celebrating achieving the small steps on the way to reaching big goals and enhancing people’s well-being through better human connections. These conditions have been shown to allow for a team’s best performance.

More broadly, developing this new approach to leadership can be expressed as making five key shifts that include, build on, and extend beyond traditional approaches:

• beyond executive to visionary, shaping a clear purpose that resonates with and generates holistic impact for all stakeholders
• beyond planner to architect, reimagining industries and innovating business systems that are able to create new levels of value
• beyond director to catalyst, engaging people to collaborate in open, empowered networks
• beyond controller to coach, enabling the organization to constantly evolve through rapid learning, and enabling colleagues to build new mindsets, knowledge, and skills
• beyond boss to human, showing up as one’s whole, authentic self

Together, these shifts can help a leader expand their repertoire and create a new level of value for an organization’s stakeholders. The last shift is the most important, as it is based on developing a new level of consciousness and awareness of our inner state. Leaders who look inward  and take a journey of genuine self-discovery make profound shifts in themselves and their lives; this means they are better able to benefit their organization. That involves developing “profile awareness” (a combination of a person’s habits of thought, emotions, hopes, and behavior in different circumstances) and “state awareness” (the recognition of what’s driving a person to take action). Combining individual, inward-looking work with outward-facing actions can help create lasting change.

Introducing McKinsey Explainers : Direct answers to complex questions

Leaders must learn to make these five shifts at three levels : transforming and evolving personal mindsets and behaviors; transforming teams to work in new ways; and transforming the broader organization by building new levels of agility, human-centeredness, and value creation into the entire enterprise’s design and culture.

An example from the COVID-19 era offers a useful illustration of this new approach to leadership. In pursuit of a vaccine breakthrough, at the start of the pandemic Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel increased the frequency of executive meetings  from once a month to twice a week. The company implemented a decentralized model enabling teams to work independently and deliver on the bold goal of providing 100 million doses of vaccines in 12 months. “The pace was unprecedented,” Bancel said.

What is the impact of this new approach to leadership?

This new approach to leadership is far more effective. While the dynamics are complex, countless studies show empirical links among effective leadership, employee satisfaction, customer loyalty, and profitability.

How can leaders empower employees?

Empowering employees , surprisingly enough, might mean taking a more hands-on leadership approach. Organizations whose leaders successfully empower others through coaching are nearly four times more likely to make swift, good decisions and outperform other companies . But this type of coaching isn’t always natural for those with a more controlling or autocratic style.

Here are five tips to get started  if you’re a leader looking to empower others:

• Provide clear rules, for example, by providing guardrails for what success looks like and communicating who makes which decisions. Clarity and boundary structures like role remits and responsibilities help to contain any anxiety associated with work and help teams stay focused on their primary tasks.
• Establish clear roles, say, by assigning one person the authority to make certain decisions.
• Avoid being a complicit manager—for instance, if you’ve delegated a decision to a team, don’t step in and solve the problem for them.
• Address culture and skills, for instance, by helping employees learn how to have difficult conversations.
• Begin soliciting personal feedback from others, at all levels of your organization, on how you are experienced as a leader.

How can leaders communicate effectively?

Good, clear communication is a leadership hallmark. Fundamental tools of effective communication  include:

• defining and pointing to long-term goals
• listening to and understanding stakeholders
• creating openings for dialogue
• communicating proactively

And in times of uncertainty, these things are important for crisis communicators :

• give people what they need, when they need it
• communicate clearly, simply, and frequently
• choose candor over charisma
• revitalize a spirit of resilience
• distill meaning from chaos
• support people, teams, and organizations to build the capability for self-sufficiency

Learn more about our People & Organizational Performance Practice .

Is leadership different in a hybrid workplace?

A leader’s role may look slightly different in remote or hybrid workplace settings . Rather than walking around a physical site, these leaders might instead model what hybrid looks like, or orchestrate work based on tasks, interactions, or purpose. Being communicative and radiating positivity  can go a long way. Leaders need to find other ways to be present and accessible, for example, via virtual drop-in sessions, regular company podcasts, or virtual townhalls. Leaders in these settings may also need to find new ways to get authentic feedback. These tactics can include pulse surveys or learning to ask thoughtful follow-up questions that reveal useful management insights.

Additional considerations, such as making sure that in-person work and togetherness has a purpose, are important. Keeping an eye on inclusivity in hybrid work  is also crucial. Listening to what employees want, with an eye to their lived experience, will be vital to leaders in these settings. And a focus on output, outcomes, results, and impact—rather than arbitrary norms about time spent in offices— may be a necessary adaptation in the hybrid era .

How should CEOs lead in this new world?

Just as for leadership more broadly, today’s environment requires CEOs to lead very differently. Recent research indicates that one-third to one-half of new CEOs fail within 18 months.

What helps top performers thrive today? To find out, McKinsey led a research effort to identify the CEOs who achieved breakaway success. We examined 20 years’ worth of data on 7,800 CEOs—from 3,500 public companies across 70 countries and 24 industries. The result is the McKinsey book CEO Excellence: The Six Mindsets That Distinguish the Best Leaders from the Rest (Scribner, March 2022). Watch an interview with the authors for more on what separates the best CEOs from the rest .

Getting perspective on leadership from CEOs themselves is enlightening—and illustrates the nuanced ways in which the new approach to leadership described above can be implemented in practice. Here are a few quotes drawn from McKinsey’s interviews with these top-level leaders :

• “I think the fundamental role of a leader is to look for ways to shape the decades ahead, not just react to the present, and to help others accept the discomfort of disruptions to the status quo.” — Indra Nooyi , former chairman and CEO of PepsiCo
• “The single most important thing I have to do as CEO is ensure that our brand continues to be relevant.” — Chris Kempczinski , CEO of McDonald’s
• “Leaders of other enterprises often define themselves as captains of the ship, but I think I’m more the ship’s architect or designer. That’s different from a captain’s role, in which the route is often fixed and the destination defined.” — Zhang Ruimin , CEO of Haier
• “I think my leadership style [can be called] ‘collaborative command.’ You bring different opinions into the room, you allow for a really great debate, but you understand that, at the end of the day, a decision has to be made quickly.” — Adena Friedman , CEO of Nasdaq
• “We need an urgent refoundation of business and capitalism around purpose and humanity. To find new ways for all of us to lead so that we can create a better future, a more sustainable future.” — Hubert Joly , former chairman and CEO of Best Buy

What is leadership development?

Leaders aren’t born; they learn to lead over time. Neuroplasticity refers to the power of the brain to form new pathways and connections through exposure to novel, unfamiliar experiences. This allows adults to adapt, grow, and learn new practices throughout our lifetimes.

When it comes to leadership within organizations, this is often referred to as leadership development. Programs, books, and courses on leadership development abound, but results vary.

Leadership development efforts fail for a variety of reasons. Some overlook context; in those cases, asking a simple question (something like “What, precisely, is this program for?”) can help. Others separate reflections on leadership from real work, or they shortchange the role of adjusting leaders’ mindsets, feelings, assumptions, and beliefs, or they fail to measure results.

So what’s needed for successful leadership development? Generally, developing leaders is about creating contexts where there is sufficient psychological safety in combination with enough novelty and unfamiliarity to cultivate new leadership practices in response to stimuli. Leadership programs that successfully cultivate leaders are also built around “placescapes”—these are novel experiences, like exploring wilderness trails, practicing performing arts, or writing poetry.

When crafting a leadership development program, there are six ingredients to incorporate  that lead to true organizational impact:

• Set up for success:
• Focus your leadership transformation on driving strategic objectives and initiatives.
• Commit the people and resources needed.
• Be clear about focus:
• Engage a critical mass of leaders to reach a tipping point for sustained impact.
• Zero in on the leadership shifts that drive the greatest value.
• Execute well:
• Architect experiential journeys to maximize shifts in mindsets, capabilities, and practices.
• Measure for holistic impact.

A well-designed and executed leadership development program can help organizations build leaders’ capabilities broadly, at scale. And these programs can be built around coaching, mentoring, and having people try to solve challenging problems—learning skills by applying them in real time to real work.

What are mentorship, sponsorship, and apprenticeship?

Mentorship, sponsorship, and apprenticeship can also be part of leadership development efforts. What are they? Mentorship refers to trusted counselors offering guidance and support on various professional issues, such as career progression. Sponsorship is used to describe senior leaders who create opportunities to help junior colleagues succeed. These roles are typically held by more senior colleagues, whereas apprenticeship could be more distributed. Apprenticeship  describes the way any colleague with domain expertise might teach others, model behaviors, or transfer skills. These approaches can be useful not only for developing leaders but also for helping your company upskill or reskill employees quickly and at scale.

For more in-depth exploration of these topics, see McKinsey’s insights on People & Organizational Performance . Learn more about McKinsey’s Leadership & Management  work—and check out job opportunities if you’re interested in working at McKinsey.

Articles referenced include:

• “ Author Talks: What separates the best CEOs from the rest? ,” December 15, 2021, Carolyn Dewar , Scott Keller , and Vik Malhotra
• “ From the great attrition to the great adaptation ,” November 3, 2021, Aaron De Smet  and Bill Schaninger
• “ The boss factor: Making the world a better place through workplace relationships ,” September 22, 2020, Tera Allas  and Bill Schaninger
• " Leading agile transformation: The new capabilities leaders need to build 21st century organizations ," October 1, 2018, Aaron De Smet , Michael Lurie , and Andrew St. George
• " Leading Organizations: Ten Timeless Truths ," 2017, Scott Keller  and Mary Meaney
• “ Leadership in context ,” January 1, 2016, Michael Bazigos, Chris Gagnon, and Bill Schaninger
• “ Decoding leadership: What really matters ,” January 1, 2015, Claudio Feser, Fernanda Mayol, and Ramesh Srinivasan

Want to know more about leadership?

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5 Principles of Purposeful Leadership

• Hubert Joly

Understanding why you’re in the room is more important than being the smartest one in it.

The traditional model of the leader-hero who saves the day, knows it all, is the smartest person in the room, and is too often driven by power, fame, glory, or money is not appropriate in today’s environment. People today expect a different kind of leader. While each company needs to define its own leadership point of view, the author presents five attributes that characterizes leaders who are able to unleash the kind of human magic you see at work at some of the most high-performing companies. First, be clear about your purpose. Second, be clear about your role. Third, be clear about whom you serve. Fourth, be driven by values. Finally, be authentic.

Growing up, I thought successful leaders were supposed to figure out all the answers on their own. Being smart — and making sure everyone else knew it — seemed to be their most striking attribute. The best schools were supposed to lead to the best jobs, which produced the best leaders. Power, fame, glory, and money were the measure of professional success. Early in my career, prominent business leaders like GE’s Jack Welch were revered for their intellect, strategic sense, and hard-charging style. They were considered infallible geniuses, inspiring a quasi-cult following.

• Hubert Joly is the former chairman and CEO of Best Buy, a senior lecturer at Harvard Business School, and the coauthor of The Heart of Business .

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ESSEC Business School Signs MoU with Misk Schools for Customized Leadership Development Programs

ESSEC Business School is pleased to announce the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Misk Schools from Saudi Arabia, represented by Dr. Steffen Sommer, Director General. This MoU signifies a collaborative effort to develop customized programs aimed at fostering leadership development among female participants. The programs will be offered at ESSEC campuses in La Défense, Paris, and Singapore.

The key elements of the MoU include : 

• Ambition to co-create and deliver a custom program tailored to address the leadership development of the future talents of the female students at MISK Schools through a series of training programs at ESSEC, including an academic and experiential component for students to experience during the academic year, targeting to launch the first module for the 2023/2024 
• To co-develop a learning journey for the female students at MISK Schools , with a core content on leadership, leading to one-week modules in Paris or Singapore, two of our ESSEC Campuses.
• Enhance student academic content (concepts, exercises, simulations, group work) but also experiential learning through a variety of site visits and guest speakers broadening their understanding.
• Knowledge sharing with private, public and nonprofit organizations in different sectors (such as French entrepreneurship ecosystem, luxury and hospitality industry)
• The immersion modules in the French and/ or Singaporean ecosystems with a global impact will be taught by ESSEC Faculty and practitioners, content will be custom made to better fit the learning objectives set by MISK Schools and ESSEC Business School.  

PRESENTATION OF MISK SCHOOLS

The Misk Foundation, founded by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman, focuses on philanthropy in education, culture, and media. Misk Schools, a part of the foundation, aims to set a new standard for non-profit private education in Saudi Arabia and be recognized among the top 10 schools worldwide. Located in Riyadh, the new Misk Schools campus within the Prince Mohammed Bin Salman Nonprofit City nurtures and develops future leaders. With a capacity for over 1000 students, Misk Schools provides personalized timetables, combining project-based and experiential learning with traditional academics to prepare students for real-world success.

ABOUT DR. STEFFEN SOMMER

Dr. Steffen Sommer, the Director General of Misk Schools, is a highly accomplished educational leader with over 25 years of experience in senior roles across Europe and the Middle East. His expertise lies in High Performance Learning (HPL), and he has led renowned international schools in various locations, including Doha, Paris, and The Hague. Dr. Sommer's exceptional career highlights include his tenure as Principal of Doha College, where the institution became the world's first "HPL World Class School" and received accolades such as the School Sustainability Initiative award. With a deep understanding of the Middle East and fluency in multiple languages, Dr. Sommer's contributions to international education extend beyond his role as Vice Chair of the Council of British International Schools (COBIS) and involvement in esteemed professional associations.

Kwankwaso To Chair The New Narrative Newspaper’s Book Presentation

F ormer Governor of Kano State, Senator Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso is to chair the much anticipated, The New Narrative Newspaper’s public presentation of the book titled “The Inclined Leader: Rediscovering The Principles for Your Personal Development and Growth authored by the newspapers’ Publisher and Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Kalu Okoronkwo.

The event, with the theme: Empowering Leadership & Fostering Good Governance for Sustainable Development, will be held on Wednesday, July 17, 2024.

Kwankwaso, a former Minister of Defence and Presidential candidate of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) during the 2023 general election in Nigeria, graciously penned the foreword to the book and brings a wealth of experience and insight to his role as Chairman of the event.

Known for his dedication to leadership excellence and visionary governance, Kwankwaso’s participation at the book presentation event promises to elevate the significance of the occasion and foster meaningful discussions among guests.

Speaking on the book launch, the Publisher of The New Narrative Newspaper, Mr Kalu Okoronkwo, said that the editorial board and management of the newspaper are honoured to have Kwankwaso penned the foreword to the book and also to chair the public presentation.

“Kwankwaso’s reputation as a principled leader and advocate for positive change perfectly aligns with the themes and messages conveyed in The Inclined Leader.

“We are confident that his presence will enhance the significance of the event and inspire engaging dialogue among participants,” said Kalu.

The book is a compendium on leadership and offers valuable insights and perspectives on leadership and good governance.

“The book presentation event will also provide attendees with an opportunity to engage and participate in discussions and gain deeper insights into the issues addressed in the book,” he emphasized.

He added that the event will draw participants and stakeholders among political office holders, government officials, business leaders, academics and the general public.

“Attendees can anticipate intellectual stimulation, lively discourse, and networking opportunities with fellow thought leaders and professionals” he concluded.

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Dissertation Presentation for Angela Chapman in the Doctoral Program for Educational Leadership for Social Justice

Join us for a dissertation presentation by  Angela Chapman  on  Friday, May 10, at 2 p.m. 

Title: Successful Black Females with Childhood Parental Substance Use Disorder (SUD) Histories and their Perseverance through the Community College           

This qualitative study examined the reports of successful Black women with childhood parental substance use disorder (SUD) histories regarding their behaviors and strategies used when completing their community college degree to bridge their later success.  Using narrative inquiry as a research design and positive deviance theory as a framework, this study explicitly considered the individual voice and perspective of successful Black female community college alumna with a parental SUD history, providing a thorough understanding of their experience, and highlighting individual asset-based data. The study identified six themes related to the behaviors and strategies used by four successful Black female alumnae of the community college, referred in the study as positive role models. 

The findings from this research study serve as an important contribution to the field as it shifts the historical focus on the deficiencies of Black women in community colleges to an asset-based approach that identifies behaviors and strategies leading to success. Thus, the study provides institutional leaders and practitioners in the community college with insights into the unique realities of the behaviors and strategies of successful Black female students with a parental substance use disorder history. These findings may inform institutional policies, practices, and programs that will reduce the long-standing achievement gap between Black women and women of other races in community colleges.

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[Updated 2023] The 5 Leadership Styles Along (With PPT Templates Included)

Lakshya Khurana

Leaders make an organization, whether a company, a school, or a government organization. The main goal of a leader is to establish an environment conducive to success, with unrelenting focus on encouraging communication and teamwork among people they lead. 

Leaders also provide direction, vision and inspire and motivate people to achieve organizational goals. Competent management and effective leadership are necessary for businesses to meet their goals.

How you manage your team depends on your personality and how you interact with others, regardless of the size of your team (it may be 10 or 10,000). Knowing your preferred style of leadership is the first step to enhancing it. 

In this blog, we'll discuss the most-renowned five prevailing leadership styles with readymade PowerPoint Templates.  and then go into how to identify and cultivate your own style. 

If you want to improve your leadership skills , read our full blog here .

Coming back to leadership styles, the five most common leadership styles are autocratic, participative, delegative, transactional, and transformational. Each style has its advantages and disadvantages when it comes to leading people.

The leader takes complete control over all decisions, usually excluding staff from the process and dictates procedures and goals.

• Participative

Leaders are open to employee feedback, value their teams' opinions, and involve them in decision-making. Participative leaders pay close attention to the individuals they lead.

Autonomy and adaptability are values that such leaders support. The freedom this leadership style delegates can be advantageous when the people being managed are highly trained, educated about their occupations, and capable of working efficiently with minimum monitoring.

• Transactional

The transactional leadership style adheres to traditional managers' stereotypes, emphasizing organization, monitoring, performance, compliance, and goal-setting while motivating employees through incentives and penalties.

• Transformational

Vision is everything, as these managers encourage their staff members and use empowerment, empathy, and recognition to energize their groups, assist them in achieving their objectives, and inspire them to go above and beyond to realize a common purpose.

This primer done, we now dig deep into top 15 PPT Templates that SlideTeam has curated to help you identify and build leadership styles of your own. 

As always, each of leadership ppt templates are 100% editable and customizable. The content-ready nature means you get a starting point for your presentations and a much-coveted structure. The editability feature means you can tailor the presentation to your audience requirements.  

Let’s take a tour now!

Template 1: Leadership Styles Quadrant Matrix for Motivation Enhancement

Positive thinking and a clear vision create motivational leadership. Motivational leaders are action-oriented, establish clear objectives, and give their people the resources and tools needed to succeed. They bring out the best in their team members and encourage them to work together toward a common objective. The quadrant template offered here evaluates where you stand on the opposing forces of direction versus supporting behaviors. This is a clear visual indication of your leadership style and helps you decide what to do to improve. Get this template now, and start work on your leadership skills with immediate effect. 

Template 2: Leadership and Board Leadership Styles Best PPT PowerPoint Presentation Gallery Deck

Increase focus on issues affecting individuals with our predesigned leadership and board leadership PPT Template. Use the presentation template to discuss leadership styles like commanding, visionary, affiliative, democratic, pacesetting, or coaching. It will help you to improve your leadership and provide good governance for your organization. Download now and deliver your ideas. The tabular format mapping each leadership style to a leader’s mannerisms makes it clear to distinguish between the types.  

Template 3: Six Leadership Styles for Every Business

The six leadership styles that US author and world-renowned authority on emotional intelligence Daniel Goleman developed are illustrated in this PPT Template. For project managers and business owners, the idea has enormous advantages. It aids in creating a brief evaluation and a clear connection of the effects of leadership on people and their surroundings. Most often, leaders must be able to change their leadership styles as the situation demands. Download now to study the six styles that range from visionary to autocratic.

Template 4: Leadership Styles Economy Study Considering Business Level Strategies

Strategy formulation is an essential process in business. Talk in-depth about leadership considering business-level strategies and their significance. Use this PPT Template to research theories and inform your audience about diverse leadership styles and economic studies. This PPT template is a handy tool for providing direction for your actions.

Template 5: Leadership and Broad Leadership Styles Talk PPT Presentation Portfolio Styles

Use this fantastic PPT Template, designed to describe broad leadership styles. This slide presents a leadership style based on the relationship and tasks. It also explains how leadership styles can use employee capabilities to establish high-performing teams. Download now and demonstrate how a leader should manage their team to complete a project or business venture.

Template 6: Customer Management Systems Leadership Styles Concentric Marketing Commerce Strategies

The customer service industry has to use leadership strategies pretty frequently. Analyzing each one and finding the best for your business is key for business success. Use our readymade PPT Templates to compare and contrast leadership styles and create concentric marketing commerce strategies. Download and obtain the information.

Template 7: Four Leadership Styles Hersey and Blanchard Corporate Leadership

According to the Hersey-Blanchard Model, no leadership style is superior. The approach advises that leaders should adapt their techniques to those they lead and their strengths rather than concentrating on workplace conditions. Our predesigned PPT template on four leadership styles helps discuss the task and relationship-relevant leadership styles. Download now and see leadership as a fluid dynamic than mere fixed personality traits. 

Template 8: Leadership Styles Based on Authority Democratic Corporate Leadership

Leaders must showcase specific emotional intelligence skills like self-confidence to have their way. They must create a vision and motivate others to follow it. Use our predesigned PPT template to discuss leader’s action plans according to their leadership style. It will help them to decide what should be done and how to do it. The ultimate aim is to achieve strategic business goals. Get this template now!

Template 9: Four Effective Change Leadership Styles for Managers

Influential leaders adapt their behavior or approach to leadership in response to conditions. This PPT Template presents data on leadership styles. You can discuss authoritative, rational, positive influence, and supportive leadership styles in detail and choose what fits best for effective business results. This PPT offers an excellent foundation for defining the extent of change and determining how to support the workforce during the transition. Get this presentation template now!

Template 10: Situational Leadership Style Matrix with Followers Readiness

Leaders must modify strategies to suit conditions. Leaders deal with levels of follower-readiness by altering their relative emphasis on work and relationship behaviors. Use our PPT template matrix to showcase leadership style behavior according to tasks. Use this template to also discuss development levels of followers and build strategies. Get this template now!

Template 11: Leadership Styles Based on Authority Consultative PPT PowerPoint File Shapes

Recognizing your leadership style lets you give staff members the right direction and feedback. Disperse knowledge on authority-based leadership styles such as autocratic, democratic, free-rein, and persuasive using our PPT Template. Download this presentation template now!

Template 12: Key Behaviours of Four DISC Leadership Styles

Introducing the DISC model PPT Template to discuss the critical behavior of leaders to understand themselves. The DISC model analyses four personality factors to determine a person's overall behavioral style and preferences, i.e., Dominance(D), Influence(I), Steadiness(S), and Consciousness(C). Using this PPT template, you can discuss behavior and its impact on the organization. Download and share your ideas with your team to create the maximum impact with minimum fuss. 

Template 13: Organizational Multiple Leadership Styles Matrix

Leadership styles and techniques can differ depending on how complicated an organization’s structure is. Highlight organizational multiple leadership styles with this matrix chart PPT Template. Business leaders can use this presentation template to discuss leader details, goal alignment, unstructured issues, acceptance, fairness, disagreement, and common acceptance. Download now!

Template 14: Addressing Strategic Leadership Styles Strategic Planning Guide for Managers

This PPT Template allows you to display details about leadership, mostly on innovative, directive, and collaborative styles. You can discuss the qualities of each leadership style and advantages and disadvantages. Compare and contrast and make decisions. The slideshow is helpful for strategic planning managers and entrepreneurs. Get it now!

Template 15: Leadership Styles Integrated Model for Employee Management

This predesigned PPT Template works as a guide to improve the performance of others. You can use this integrated model to discus motivation, recognition, delegation, flexibility, structure, and global focus. It will be helpful to modify your leadership style according to the situation. Download now and start on the path to build a strong leadership style.

LEADERSHIP IS A MUST!

Leadership is both pleasing and challenging. The opportunities for rewards are numerous, but so are the obligations. Everyone has what it takes to be a leader in their field. Here is the road map to becoming a good and effective leader. Use these templates to make the necessary modifications and establish excellent leadership in your organization.

FAQs on Leadership Styles

What are the four main leadership styles.

No company can run effectively without leadership. Your leadership style determines how you influence those around you and how your actions affect the success of your business or division. The four main leadership styles are:

In autocratic leadership, a single person controls the organization or team. An autocratic boss dictates everything to subordinates. 

The democratic leadership method entails soliciting feedback and subordinates; the idea is that everyone can participate in decision-making.

• Laissez-faire

It entails empowering your staff, remaining detached, and trusting them to complete the task without continual supervision or questioning.

Transformational leadership involves establishing an ambitious goal and organizing your team around it.

What are the seven leadership styles in management?

Business leaders can adapt and lead effectively in any situation by being aware of the traits of below seven different leadership styles:

• Autocratic or Authoritative Leadership
• Democratic or Participative Leadership
• Coaching Leadership
• Strategic Leadership
• Transformational Leadership
• Laissez- Faire Leadership
• Charismatic Leadership

Each of these styles has both pros and cons attaches to it. The best course of action for a leader is, of course, to see which style fits which situation. This is very hard to do in practice, but good leaders do give it their best shot. 

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• Top 15 Leadership PPT Templates To Inspire and Motivate your Peers
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• Top 7 Leadership Development Plan Templates with Examples and Samples
• Top 10 Leadership Presentation Templates with Examples and Samples

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• Luxembourg Tax Alert 2024-04

Amendments to Luxembourg-Germany Double Tax Treaty Applicable Since 1 January 2024

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On 6 July 2023 Luxembourg and Germany signed an amending Protocol (hereafter ‘the Amending Protocol) to the Germany-Luxembourg tax treaty (hereafter ‘the DTT’), which has been recently commented by a circular issued by the Luxembourg tax authorities 1  (hereafter ‘the Circular’). 

The Amending Protocol incorporates certain provisions implementing the BEPS Multilateral Instrument (hereafter ‘the MLI’) and modifies several significant provisions affecting employees, employers, corporate taxpayers and investment funds. 

The key changes are the following:

Extension of the tolerance threshold for cross-border workers to 34 days; 

Introduction of a new ‘effectively taxed’ clause (hereafter ‘the Clause’) to avoid double non-taxation;

Amendment of the provisions related to treaty benefits granted to investment funds; 

Revision of the provisions on exit tax in the case of a change of tax residence; and

Insertion of the anti-abuse provision of the MLI (preamble and principal purpose test).  

Given that these provisions already apply since 1 January 2024, we generally recommend that a careful impact assessment of current situations or structures is performed.

Whilst the following tax alert is focusing on corporate taxpayers and investment funds, please refer to our separate tax alert for an overview of the impacts for individuals and cross-border workers.

I. Dividend Income and treaty benefits for investment funds

The Amending Protocol did not change the withholding tax (hereafter “WHT”) rates, and as such article 10 of the DTT still provides the following WHT relief on dividend income: WHT can be reduced to 5%, if the beneficial owner is a company which directly holds at least 10% of the capital of the company paying the dividends, or 15%, in all other cases.

However, it is now specified that dividends paid by a German real estate investment trust company (REIT-AG) or by a Luxembourg real estate company which essentially corresponds to a German REIT-AG for tax purposes, and dividends paid to an undertaking for collective investment (hereafter ‘UCI’) can only benefit from the 15% WHT (and not the reduced 5% rate). 

The Protocol also provides that the definition of dividend income includes distributions arising from UCI meaning these specific distributions will now be covered by article 10 of the amended DTT.

A key consideration from the Amending Protocol is that the following UCI (to the extent they are not setup as partnerships) may now have access to treaty benefits (notably for dividends and also interest):  (1) an investment fund within the meaning of either the UCI law, the SIF law or the RAIF law (operating either under the SIF or the SICAR regime) for Luxembourg; (2)  an investment fund within the meaning of the Investment Tax Act ("Investmentsteuergesetz") for Germany; and (3) certain other Luxembourg or German investment funds agreed by the competent authorities of the Contracting States to the extent they meet specific criteria 2 . 

Finally, the amended DTT now also provides for a look-through approach:

When the dividend income is derived by an entity considered as transparent by one Contracting State and is attributable for tax purposes to a person resident in the same Contracting State, such a person is then considered to derive the dividend income directly for the purpose of the amended article 10. 

As a result, when a contractual fund such as a Luxembourg FCP receives a German source dividend and is held by residents of Luxembourg, the latter should be entitled to treaty benefits as the direct recipients of the German source dividend. In practice, it may force Germany to consider a Luxembourg FCP as tax transparent in the situation above described even though Germany treats it as opaque based on its domestic law.

However, if the German source dividend is distributed to a Luxembourg FCP held by non-Luxembourg resident investors and (necessarily) qualifying as a UCI, such Luxembourg FCP would itself directly be considered as having access to the reduced WHT rate of 15% under article 10 of the amended DTT as a resident. 

II. Exit Tax

Article 6 of the Amending Protocol provides a new paragraph replacing paragraph 6 of Article 13 of the DTT. This provision covers the disposal of shares by a person (an individual or company) resident in one Contracting State but previously resident in the other State. 

If the other State has taxed the latent capital gains on the shares upon exit, the new State of tax residence would then have to compute the taxable gain on the basis of the value used upon exit in the other State, provided that such a basis does not exceed the fair market value. In other words, the new State of tax residence would only tax a potential incremental gain.

III. Method to avoid double taxation - ‘effectively taxed’ Clause

Germany was already applying the credit method to specific types of income (e.g. capital gains on the shares of land-rich companies) based on the previous DTT. The Amending Protocol now provides that Germany also applies the credit method to items of income or elements of capital whose taxation right is allocated to Luxembourg under the DTT, but which are not effectively taxed in Luxembourg.

Whilst such a clause was inserted in several double tax treaties concluded by Germany, the interpretation of this concept of “effectively taxed” may in practice trigger extensive discussions.

You would find some clarifications in the Amending Protocol 3  as well as useful examples on employment income in the Mutual Agreement 4  and in the Circular. However, it remains relatively unclear to which extent an income (other than the specific income always subject to the credit method) whose taxation right is attributable to Luxembourg based on the DTT, but which is in practice tax exempt based on Luxembourg domestic law (for example, under the participation exemption regime), would be considered as “effectively taxed”.

We recommend monitoring this topic going forward.

In practice, we expect potential areas of risks in situations where an income is subject to the credit method in Germany but it is also not exempt under German domestic law.

IV. Entitlement to Benefits / Preamble and Principal Purpose Test (PPT)

The Preamble has been amended in accordance with the MLI and now provides that the DTT intends to eliminate double taxation without creating opportunities for non-taxation or reduced taxation through tax evasion or avoidance (including through treaty-shopping arrangements). 

Article 12 of the Amending Protocol has incorporated the PPT as provided by the MLI into Article 27 of the DTT. As a result, a benefit under the DTT should be denied if it is reasonable to conclude, having regard to all relevant facts and circumstances, that obtaining the benefit was one of the principal purposes of any arrangement or transaction that resulted directly or indirectly in that benefit, unless it is established that granting that benefit in these circumstances would be in accordance with the object and purpose of the relevant provisions of the DTT.

(1) Circular L.G.- Conv. D.I. n°71 dated 18 March 2024:  … (public.lu)  (PDF) (2) Entities which (i) may be widely held, (ii) directly or indirectly own a diversified portfolio of securities or, alternatively, invest directly or indirectly into immovable property with the main purpose of deriving rental income, (iii) are subject to investor protection rules in their jurisdiction of establishment and (iv) are either established in Luxembourg or in Germany (3) Point 2 of paragraph (2) of article 13, amending the Protocol of 2012 attached to the DTT (4) Point VII. of the Mutual Agreement signed by Luxembourg and Germany on 11 January 2024: Konsultationsvereinbarung vom 11. Januar 2024 zur Anwendung des Abkommens vom 23. April 2012 in der Fassung des Änderungsprotokolls vom 6. Juli 2023 zwischen der Bundesrepublik Deutschland und dem Großherzogtum Luxemburg zur Vermeidung der Doppelbesteuerung und der Verhinderung der Steuerhinterziehung auf dem Gebiet der Steuern vom Einkommen und vom Vermögen (bundesfinanzministerium.de (PDF))

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Luxembourg Tax Alert

KPMG's Luxembourg Tax Alert is a regular newsletter which covers the latest tax developments affecting Luxembourg