Empower your leaders to own their soft skill development

Leaders are busy people, and they don't always have time for formal training. That's why L&D teams should empower leaders to take control of their own soft skill development with highly personalised learning interventions in the flow of work. From AI skills intelligence to AI coaching, find out how you can put soft skill development back on the agenda for your leadership team.

We ask a lot of our leaders. They’re expected to manage people, inspire teams, make decisions, stay calm under pressure and somehow still find time for their own personal development.

The trouble is, most managers absolutely have no idea when it comes to understanding where they need to grow – especially around soft skills.

They might know they could be a better listener, or that they sometimes struggle to delegate, or that they could get to the point quicker, but when you’re constantly firefighting day to day, it’s hard to find the space (or the guidance) to work on those things.

And that’s a real problem, because those soft skills are the ones that make the biggest difference to how teams feel, communicate and perform.

Why does most leadership development feel so generic?

When it comes to soft skill development, too many managers are still being handed a one-size-fits-all solution. A workshop here, an elearning course there – along with a vague sense that they should be developing their skills, without much clarity on which skills or why those skills.

What they really need is direction.

They need to understand:

• What they’re already doing well
• Where they could grow
• Which skills actually matter for their role and their team

Of course, this won’t be the same for all leaders. Different functional areas, seniority levels and business priorities mean that while some managers will need to focus on mobilising and motivating a team of do-ers, others may need to focus on the big picture and securing long-term results.

Without this clarity, leadership soft skill development can feel like a bit of a stab in the dark. Leaders might complete the training, tick the box and move on – but it doesn’t always translate into real, lasting change, which can reduce the appetite for leadership development down the line. And because managers are busy people (arguably some of the busiest in any business), their own growth easily slips down the priority list.

So, how can organisations make soft skill development feel less like a corporate chore and more like a meaningful, personal journey?

How can L&D give leaders ownership of their own soft skill development?

The leaders who grow the most aren’t necessarily the ones who have the most time – they’re the ones who have the most clarity and ownership. You don’t necessarily need to dedicate days each month to soft skill development – building it into the flow of work ensures that leaders work on the skills they need the most when it most makes sense to them.

When a manager can clearly see what soft skills matter to their success, how strong they are in each soft skill and how they’re progressing over time, then development stops being an abstract idea and starts feeling tangible and motivating.

Those insights empower business leaders to make smarter choices about where to focus their efforts, spot patterns in their own behaviour and start noticing how even small changes make big differences. 

This sense of ownership and making soft skills visible is what Helix is all about.

How can L&D personalise skills development for individual leaders?

With traditional leadership development programmes, there are two main issues:

1. They tend to focus around one-off content delivery, such as a one-day workshop or a week-long leadership retreat, with minimal follow up.
2. They’re usually designed as one-size-fits-all programmes – they try to cater to all leadership soft skill development needs, which means they can feel bland or generic.

We build Helix to help business leaders take the guesswork out of their development, and to make learning feel a bit more human again. 

At its heart, Helix is surprisingly simple: 

1. Your business leaders invite Helix to their virtual meetings
2. Helix analyses meeting transcripts to identify the soft skills demonstrated
3. Helix sends soft skill scores and personalised guidance within minutes
4. Leaders have access to a dashboard with more detailed trend analysis and progress
5. Helix keeps soft skills front and centre of leaders’ personal development by providing them with real-time feedback and learning interventions tailored to their specific needs.

On top of the AI skills intelligence functionality, Helix takes it one step further. Helix also integrates with VeeCoach, our AI coaching agent, to support personal development with targeted interventions (such as scenarios to practise important skills) and surface useful content, making learning more of a two-way street. 

Additionally, Helix gives you the ability to add and edit your own skills and skillsets. This will allow L&D teams to build, manage, track and analyse the skills that matter to your leaders – and this can be further customised for different groups of managers, ensuring everyone has access to hyper-relevant information that will help them perform better at work.

VeeCoach: real support, not just reminders

Even with the right framework and focus in place, growth doesn’t happen overnight. That’s where VeeCoach, 5app's AI coach, comes in.

VeeCoach acts like a leadership development companion – guiding, nudging and encouraging managers as they progress, as well as supporting personal development with active learning interventions such as modelling real conversations or practising scenarios relating to their day-to-day roles. VeeCoach is there to help leaders:

• Reflect on what’s working and what isn’t
• Set realistic, personal goals
• Track how they’re growing over time
• Stay accountable – without feeling overwhelmed

It’s not about adding another task to their packed to-do list. It’s about giving busy leaders a moment to pause, think and grow, in ways that fit naturally into their day.

Adding custom skills in Helix

By popular request, we've added the ability to add and edit your own custom skills and skillsets to Helix.

This allows you to build a package of skills that make sense for your managers, based on their needs and your company culture. If you want more creative managers, you can turn that into a trackable skill. If you want them to become better at delegation, that can become a skill too. 

You can also group these custom skills together into skillsets. Your senior leadership team may have different priorities than your middle managers, so you can create frameworks that make sense for different leadership groups that are clear, relevant and adaptable. For instance, if you're using a popular leadership framework such as Transformational Leadership or Servant Leadership, you can create a skillset that tracks the most relevant skills across your leadership team to ensure it's having the desired impact.

When managers can see that you’re committed to supporting their development with relevant, genuinely useful skills, they will naturally take more ownership of their development. This level of personalisation makes it less about ticking the boxes and more about making it OK to acknowledge and address their own strengths and opportunities for growth.

Why does soft skill development matter for leaders today?

The name ‘soft skills’ may be doing these crucial skills a disservice. Soft skills are what hold everything together at work – especially for leaders, who need to motivate, influence and guide people every single day. That’s just not possible with weak soft skills. The leaders who can listen, empathise, adapt and communicate effectively are the ones who help their teams thrive, even when things get tough – and that all comes from focused, sustained personal development.

When businesses give their leaders the tools (and tech) to really understand themselves, amazing things happen. Teams feel more supported. Communication improves. Confidence grows. Results skyrocket.

To be clear, personal development isn’t about turning leaders into something they’re not. It’s about helping them develop into the best versions of themselves, and letting that ripple out across the business. After all, a leader who communicates, listens and coaches better doesn’t just feel the benefit themselves – it’s hugely beneficial for their employees, colleagues and the business as a whole.

How can L&D make leaders' soft skill development intentional?

Personal development for leaders doesn’t have to be complicated, time-consuming or generic. It just needs to be intentional – and even more importantly, it just needs to happen, even if it happens imperfectly.

With Helix’s VeeCoach integration and custom skillsets, you’re empowering your leaders to take ownership of their personal development. With unique insights into their current soft skills and a nudge in the right direction to work on growth areas, leaders finally have the structure and support they need to put personal development back on the agenda, leading to stronger teams, better conversations and a more human workplace for everyone.