L&D In Action: Winning Strategies from Learning Leaders
Becoming Coachable: How Great Leaders Develop Great Leaders by Embracing Continuous Learning
September 5, 2023
Leaders lead. But that doesn’t mean leaders stop learning, and only focus on guiding their teams to great outcomes and results, does it? While the obvious answer is ‘no, plenty of leaders still find themselves losing that enthusiastic habit of learning they had earlier in their careers. Remaining coachable is one of the quintessential traits of all successful leaders. This week’s guest, Kevin Wilde, has 30+ years leading leaders at world-renowned organizations to prove it. And, he’ll share his insights on how we can develop and become more coachable leaders.
The greatest athletes in the world have all had coaches, even in their prime. Lebron James, Serena Williams, Leo Messi–all continued to be coached for the duration of their careers. Because even when you achieve greatness, there is always more to learn. So, why then, do so many business leaders and managers stop learning when they earn their leadership positions? According to Kevin Wilde, there are about 6 reasons leaders drop the learning habit, and a lack of coachability holds them back from truly becoming great.

Kevin has had an illustrious career in learning and development. He started with 17 years at General Electric, developing all the leaders at the company and spending time at the Crotonville Leadership Institute. His next 17 years were at General Mills as CLO, where he helped earn the company recognition by Fortune for its Leadership Development program. All in all, very few people have spent as much time with as many leaders as Kevin has. Today, he shares his insights for developing and becoming more coachable leaders.

Join us as we discuss:


If you enjoyed this episode, make sure to subscribe, rate and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Google Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Episode Resources

Kevin Wilde on LinkedIn
Kevin Wilde website
getAbstract website
getAbstract on LinkedIn


L&D In Action: Winning Strategies from Learning Leaders releases every other Tuesday, bringing you conversations from the best minds in Learning and Development.

Previous guests include: Simon Brown of Novartis, Ravin Jesuthasan of Mercer, Michael Lee Stallard of Connection Culture Group, Michelle Weise of Rise and Design and Dr. Nigel Paine of Learning Now TV.

Check out our five most downloaded episodes: