No factor is more essential to developing a culture of high performance than strong leadership. That’s why names like Tim Cook, Mary Barra, Sam Altman, and Meg Whitman are so widely known. And none of those leaders would have achieved their status without building a team of strong leaders at every level in their organizations.
We’ve noted the critical importance of strong leadership here before in our posts on how to become a great leader and the negative impacts of bad leadership.
In high-performing organizations, leadership development is a core element of the workplace culture through the example that leaders set for their teams; formal and informal mentoring; and one-on-one coaching sessions.
Most employees aren’t natural-born leaders. But most can learn leadership skills that will help them collaborate and navigate workplace relationships more effectively. Beyond mentoring and coaching, leadership team building activities and professional development programs can play a vital role in helping employees absorb and improve these skills.
As one of the few nationwide team building companies focused on professional development, Best Corporate events has more than two decades of experience in organizing and delivering leadership-focused programs.
The Benefits of Leadership Team Building Activities
Strong, capable leadership plays a vital role in driving team performance and organizational success. Engaging in corporate team building activities can help managers assess leadership potential among their team members as well as cultivating leadership qualities such as decision-making and conflict resolution. That makes leadership team building activities important for employees at all levels.
Helping employees improve their leadership skills improves satisfaction and retention as employees recognize and appreciate that the organization is investing in their professional development. Conversely, research shows that a lack of career development and advancement opportunities is the most common reason for employees quitting their jobs.
Over the long term, investing in leadership skills for all employees increases loyalty, engagement, and productivity (by developing better communication skills). Most impactfully, it helps build a culture of high performance into the organization.
Top 11 Leadership Building Activities
Professional development workshops and even specific team competition and bonding programs can help develop leadership skills in employees – through fun and engaging activities, not dry lectures. Here’s a list of 11 specific programs that can help build and enhance leadership capabilities.
1. Conflict Resolution Training
Conflict Resolution Training transforms workplace contention from a productivity killer into a leadership development opportunity through carefully structured role-playing scenarios and guided discussions. This professional development workshop addresses the reality that disagreements are inevitable in healthy work environments. But how leaders handle these conflicts determines whether they become “bumps in the road” or sources of long-term animosity.
The workshop’s role-playing elements require participants to take on leadership responsibilities for finding mutually beneficial solutions. Using the Thomas-Kilmann Inventory assessment as their foundation, emerging leaders learn to identify their natural conflict-handling styles and adapt their approach based on specific situations and personalities involved.
Participants practice mediating between conflicting parties, guiding discussions toward productive outcomes, and helping teams move past disagreements to focus on shared objectives. These exercises develop confidence in addressing rather than avoiding conflict, a crucial leadership skill that many managers struggle with in real-world situations.
The training focuses on strengthening three essential leadership skills: active listening, negotiation, and empathy. These competencies prove invaluable for leaders who must regularly manage team tensions, facilitate open communication during difficult conversations, and build consensus.
2. Essential Supervisory Skills
When employees step into a supervisory role, their success often hinges on mastering a new, more people-centric skill set. This three- to four-hour, in-person workshop helps them make that transition smoothly.
The Essential Supervisory Skills program emphasizes cultivating an assertive (not aggressive) supervisory style. It guides new managers in recognizing and avoiding extremes – being overly passive or too domineering – and instead adopting an approach that commands respect while remaining supportive.
Participants explore core supervisory responsibilities, including understanding motivational differences, setting up continuous performance planning, and diagnosing their team’s needs to balance instructive versus supportive management behaviors. These skills help leaders tailor their approach to each direct report, encouraging autonomy when appropriate and stepping in supportively when needed.
With experiential activities and optional behavioral assessments driving engagement, the program equips new supervisors with practical tools for effective leadership, boosting individual confidence, improving team performance, and reinforcing organizational resilience.
3. Delegation Styles
The Delegation Styles workshop is a 3 to 4-hour, in-person training designed to help managers and leaders refine how they entrust work to others. It begins with an assessment that uncovers each participant’s most challenging area of delegation – whether it’s mindset, communication, execution, or avoiding common derailer – allowing for tailored, impactful learning.
Participants learn to diagnose individual needs, engage in effective delegation conversations, and execute with clarity. By exploring four key dimensions, the program equips attendees to delegate with intention and foresight:
- mindset toward delegation
- conversation practices;
- execution strategies; and
- derailers to avoid.
Through interactive exercises, each leader builds a practical action plan, pinpointing next steps to delegate more confidently and skillfully. This hands-on approach helps leaders free up their time while nurturing their team’s capacity and autonomy.
As a result, participants emerge with stronger trust-building, communication, and strategic thinking skills, ultimately elevating team efficiency, member growth, and overall organizational performance.
4. Igniting Team Performance®
Igniting Team Performance® combines fun, challenging activities with real-time leadership development as teams complete progressively difficult challenges designed to assess and improve teamwork, communication, and leadership capabilities. This dynamic training measures your group’s current performance while teaching practical lessons on goal-setting, leadership skills, and strategic communication that participants can apply immediately in the workplace.
The program’s unique approach encourages natural leadership abilities to emerge as participants step up to guide discussions, make strategic decisions under pressure, and navigate complex team dynamics throughout each challenge. Unlike traditional leadership training where roles are predetermined, these activities create authentic opportunities for different team members to demonstrate and develop their leadership potential based on situational needs and individual strengths.
The facilitated process discussions that occur between each session strengthen leadership skills by requiring participants to analyze team performance, identify improvement opportunities, and adapt strategies for better results in their next challenge. Leaders learn to recognize and leverage the diverse skills and perspectives of their team members, which is a crucial capability for workplace success.
This emphasis on team trust and respect develops leaders who can build consensus, celebrate collective achievements, and create environments where everyone feels valued and engaged. The immediate application of debrief lessons into the next challenge reinforces adaptive leadership skills that translate directly to project management and team leadership roles.
5. Belbin Behavioral Assessment
The Belbin Behavioral Assessment is a 360° feedback tool designed to evaluate an individual’s strengths and weaknesses in a team context. Participants gain clarity on how their behavioral tendencies align with the nine distinct Belbin Team Roles, helping them understand where they naturally contribute and where they may need support.
By exploring how their peers perceive their contributions, leaders develop deep self-awareness, fine-tune their collaboration skills, and learn to leverage their most effective styles – be it creative ideation, strategic evaluation, or the ability to bring ideas to action.
This assessment includes a self-perception inventory and observer assessments, along with a personal and team report.
Organizations benefit from more balanced, high-performing teams composed of individuals who understand their behavioral strengths, complement each other’s styles, and contribute in a coordinated, effective way.
6. Strength Finders
The Strength Finders experience is a personality and talent assessment developed by Gallup. Participants take the assessment to discover their natural strengths, helping them gain clarity on what energizes and motivates them in both personal and professional contexts.
By identifying individuals’ signature strengths – drawn from domains like strategic thinking, relationship building, influencing, and executing – leaders become more self-aware, learn to leverage their innate talents effectively, and understand how to position themselves for impact.
Organizations benefit from teams that are more engaged, productive, and strategically aligned. Participants emerge empowered to play to their strengths, thereby boosting confidence, cohesion, and overall performance at both individual and organizational levels.
7. Presentation Skills Training
Presentation Skills Training transforms participants from uncertain speakers into confident presenters who can deliver powerful, compelling presentations that inspire action. This comprehensive workshop teaches effective speaking skills that can serve as a critical difference-maker in leadership advancement, impacting everything from team meetings to executive presentations that affect career trajectory.
The program goes beyond basic public speaking to develop the sophisticated communication abilities that distinguish true leaders. Participants learn the crucial difference between simply sharing information and presenting it in ways that compel audiences to action; a skill that’s essential for leaders who must regularly motivate teams, secure buy-in for initiatives, persuade peers to support a program or initiative, and drive organizational change.
The workshop enhances leadership skills by boosting participants’ confidence and refining their persuasive abilities. Through video analysis and practical exercises, emerging leaders discover how their audience perceives them and learn to project the executive presence necessary for career advancement. The training covers techniques for maintaining composure during unexpected challenges, a crucial leadership capability that extends far beyond formal presentations.
Research consistently shows that strong presentation skills open doors to countless leadership opportunities, making this training an investment in long-term career advancement and organizational influence.
8. Emotional Intelligence Training
Emotional Intelligence Training helps participants develop a deeper understanding of their own emotions and how to manage them effectively while learning to respond empathetically to others’ emotional needs. This thought-provoking workshop explores the business and scientific cases for emotional intelligence, teaching leaders to tap into their emotional quotient to drive both personal and professional growth.
Emotionally intelligent leaders create cultures of trust, exceptional loyalty, and honest communication that elevate organizational performance. Participants learn to sense, understand, and effectively apply the power of emotions in workplace interactions, building the foundation for more meaningful professional relationships.
This workshop enhances leadership skills by teaching participants to communicate more effectively through enhanced social awareness and emotional control. Leaders discover how to become more influential by understanding what motivates others and responding appropriately to diverse emotional needs within their teams.
The training is ideal for both individual and team development, focusing on performance improvement and continuous growth through better relationship building. Leaders learn to assess their emotional quotient and apply these insights to create more cohesive, high-performing teams that navigate challenges with greater resilience and mutual support.
9. Manager’s Guide to Business Coaching
The Manager’s Guide to Business Coaching workshop teaches participants active listening techniques and proven coaching practices that strengthen relationships, build trust, and foster commitment within their teams. This professional development program addresses a critical responsibility all managers face: providing meaningful feedback and consistent coaching while maintaining positive working relationships and achieving desired performance outcomes.
Since effective coaching isn’t one-size-fits-all, participants learn to identify coaching techniques that align with their individual communication style while adapting these approaches for specific situations and diverse team members. Through practical exercises, managers discover how to use questions effectively, provide timely feedback, and create a supportive atmosphere that encourages growth.
The workshop enhances leadership development by teaching participants to achieve higher performance through strategic coaching conversations. Managers learn to recognize and avoid common coaching pitfalls while developing skills to work through employee resistance and push-back, challenges that often derail well-intentioned leadership efforts.
Real-life case studies and work examples provide practical frameworks for handling difficult coaching scenarios, from performance improvement to career development conversations. Participants practice eliminating unreliable coaching behaviors that undermine trust while developing a consistent, supportive approach that strengthens workplace relationships and drives results.
10. Corporate Survivor
Corporate Survivor transforms your event space into a high-energy arena where teams face off in survival-themed challenges that test collaboration and strategic thinking. This reality TV-inspired program puts participants through mentally engaging and physically active challenges – from Giant Slingshot competitions to blindfolded obstacle courses – that reflect the pressure-cooker decisions often found in real-world leadership scenarios.
The program requires participants to organically assume leadership roles throughout the experience. During activities like “Stranded in Maine,” where teams must choose survival tools under time constraints, leaders quickly discover that effectiveness isn’t about having all the answers – it’s about considering diverse perspectives and making decisive choices the entire team can rally behind.
Leadership opportunities rotate naturally among team members based on individual strengths and specific challenges. One person might excel at motivating during physical tasks while another takes charge during strategic planning, giving everyone the chance to practice leadership while learning to support others.
The leadership development impact centers on adaptability, problem-solving, and motivating others under pressure, skills that prove valuable long after teams return to work. For organizations seeking memorable leadership development beyond traditional training, Corporate Survivor delivers an experience that will impact participants for years to come.
11. Bridge to the Future
Bridge to the Future is an innovative team-building experience that develops leadership skills through collaborative construction of a symbolic bridge representing organizational aspirations. Teams work with only cardboard and duct tape to design, construct, and decorate bridge segments that reflect company values, mission, or aspirations, ultimately assembling one large, walkable structure that supports the entire group.
The program incorporates essential leadership skills including role delegation, project management, cross-functional collaboration, and shared accountability. Participants develop communication skills through “project management meetings” among team leaders, while creative problem-solving emerges as teams balance structural requirements with artistic vision.
Key benefits include demonstrating teamwork’s power in achieving large-scale goals, reinforcing alignment around common organizational vision, and blending creativity with structured project execution that mirrors real workplace challenges. The program creates a powerful visual and emotional group memory while encouraging participants to take ownership of collective success.
Organizations gain stronger cross-departmental collaboration, enhanced leadership pipeline development, and improved team cohesion. The customizable format allows integration of specific company initiatives, branded materials, and targeted messaging, making the experience directly relevant to organizational objectives and culture.
How Team Building Enhances Leadership Development Long-Term
Just as a regular exercise regimen is vital to staying physically fit, so a regular cadence of team building activities and professional development training is essential to foster sustained leadership growth. Over time, employees acquire a broad range of leadership skills they can apply in daily workplace situations.
Examples of companies known for embracing a strong, consistent approach to leadership development through team building and other professional learning programs include:
Randstad, a multinational HR consulting firm, which “established a global workplace mentoring program where every employee could find a mentor within the organization. They wanted to ensure each employee had access to training and development and support their leadership development.”
General Electric, which rotates leaders through different business functions as well as regular training and leadership development programs to build strong technical and interpersonal skills.
Adobe, where internal coaching and group discussions are combined with formal team building and professional development programs to “provide participants with leadership development, coaching, and peer support” in creating their next generation of leaders.
While each company’s approach is unique – as your organization’s is likely to be as well – what matters is creating a continuous leadership development plan that works within your structure and culture, combining mentoring and internal coaching with proven external team building programs and professional development training.
Take the Next Step in Leadership Training Activities for Employees
Strong leadership is vital for building a culture of sustained high performance. Leadership team building activities help organizations build bench strength for expansion and succession planning while improving cross-functional communication and collaboration.
Here are six actionable steps for implementing leadership development activities:
Start Small: Begin with 60-90 minute workshops like Leading Virtual Teams or Conflict Resolution Training to build momentum without overwhelming schedules.
Mix Formats: Combine structured programs (Emotional Intelligence Training, Presentation Skills) with hands-on activities (Corporate Survivor and other team building challenges) to address different learning styles.
Focus on Real Issues: Choose programs that directly address current workplace challenges – like hybrid team management, communication gaps, performance issues, or rebuilding trust and morale after a layoff.
Create Regular Touchpoints: Schedule quarterly leadership development activities rather than one-off events to reinforce skills and measure progress.
Encourage Peer Learning: Use team-based activities where participants practice leadership skills with colleagues to build ongoing support networks beyond formal training sessions.
Work with Outside Experts: Consulting with experts in leadership team building and professional development training builds on your internal mentorship and coaching programs to consistently bring new knowledge and proven practices into your leadership development efforts.
Best Corporate Events has delivered thousands of team building programs and professional development programs to organizations across North America. Ready to explore leadership team building activities for your organization? Contact us to learn more about how we can customize programs to meet your needs and get a quote on any program of your choice.
