What it looks like when an organization treats everyone's development as the business, not a program.
Kegan and Lahey spent years inside three companies that built development into daily operations rather than into a learning calendar. Their argument is that most organizations run a second, invisible job — everyone managing how they appear — and that the cost of that concealment is enormous.
The case companies are unusual and the practices are demanding; few readers will adopt them wholesale. The value is in the diagnosis, and in the questions it raises about what your own culture quietly rewards people for hiding.
Our Take
Kegan and Lahey describe organizations that make development part of everyday work, and they name the hidden cost of people managing how they appear. Ambitious and thought-provoking — valuable above all for the questions it raises about our own cultures.
Kegan, R., & Lahey, L. L. (2016). An everyone culture: Becoming a deliberately developmental organization. Harvard Business Review Press. Find it
