EMBA programmes use a wide array of methods to help experienced professionals improve their leadership skills.

Leadership development is one of the main incentives for experienced managers and executives to enroll in Executive MBA (EMBA) programmes. Many find out that in order to realise their full leadership potential, they need to gain more self-insight.

EMBA programmes use a wide array of methods to help professionals improve their leadership skills by gaining a more profound self-knowledge and exploiting their strengths to the utmost.

Why leadership development draws experienced professionals to the EMBA

You could hire an executive coach. You could attend a leadership workshop. So why commit to an EMBA – the investment of 18 to 24 months, significant tuition, and the demands of studying alongside a full career?

The answer lies in what an EMBA offers that standalone development programmes cannot: a structured, academically rigorous environment where leadership development happens in context – applied to real business challenges, tested against a cohort of peers with comparable seniority, and reinforced across every module. The result is a genuine shift in how you see yourself as a leader and how others experience you.

Becoming a better leader

No self-respecting executive education provider is indifferent to the subject of leadership. And while different courses employ diverse teaching methods and approaches, the top ones unanimously acknowledge that achieving personal growth is integral to becoming a better leader.

IMD (Switzerland), for instance, does not just want to improve your knowledge and skills in management and business. It wants to help you become a more reflective leader. Professor Stefan Michel, currently Dean of Faculty and Research at IMD, says:

“We challenge you by taking you out of your comfort zone, while providing the resources and support required for personal growth.”

Many business schools, including IMD, offer participants personal, one-on-one leadership coaching throughout the programme. One of the objectives is to give them the opportunity to better understand their own behaviour, as well as human behaviour in general.

Human psychology is also a major topic in the Leadership course of the Executive MBA programme at IESE (Spain). One of its main objectives is to teach professionals how to “do things through people” by giving them greater understanding of the basic motives that drive individuals. The course also underscores the importance of effective and meaningful interpersonal relationships in the workplace.

Understanding human behaviour can also be useful for improving leadership effectiveness. The Global Executive MBA at INSEAD (France) features a Leadership Development Programme that focuses on self-awareness, group dynamics, and behavioural change through 360-degree feedback and coaching. Participants analyse how their behaviour affects team performance and learn to adapt their leadership style accordingly.

Learning by doing: experiential leadership in action

The EMBA does not give you a clear definition of your role as a leader. You need to figure that out for yourself. Experiential leadership development programmes are often used by business schools to help participants understand what kind of leaders they are.

One of the most famous such initiatives is the LEAD programme at Chicago Booth (US), which has recently been redesigned as a comprehensive, multi-phase leadership development journey integrated throughout the MBA experience. Rather than a single course, LEAD now combines foundational coursework, experiential learning, and ongoing coaching to help students build leadership capabilities over time. As highlighted by Booth, the programme emphasises developing self-awareness, interpersonal effectiveness, and the ability to lead in complex, team-based environments.

Participants engage in exercises such as feedback, reflection, and real-world team challenges that mirror organisational dynamics. This structured approach enables students not only to better understand their own behaviour and leadership style, but also to practise influencing others, navigating conflict, and making decisions under pressure. Ultimately, LEAD supports managers and executives in crafting a personalised leadership development path that evolves alongside their academic and professional goals.

Looking inward to see outward

Business professionals enrolled in EMBA programmes are constantly encouraged to exercise introspection. The case for this kind of structured introspection is well established in leadership research. In an article entitled “The Five Minds of a Manager” for Harvard Business Review, academics Jonathan Gosling and Henry Mintzberg described the thoughtful mindset that leaders should possess:

“These days, what managers desperately need is to stop and think, to step back and reflect thoughtfully on their experiences. […] Reflect means to refold, which suggests that attention turns inward so that it can be turned outward.”

Joseph Badaracco, who has taught courses on business ethics, strategy, and management in Harvard Business School’s MBA and executive programmes, agrees:

“Leaders should learn more about themselves if they want to succeed. In other words, before you set out to manage others, you should look inside yourself and reflect on how well you can manage yourself. That takes time, and it is an unnatural act for action-oriented people. And you may not like what you see.”

Self-knowledge as curriculum

For top EMBA programmes, self-knowledge is a major element of the curriculum, either incorporated into a separate course or existing as a feature in different modules and initiatives. IESE, for instance, offers a self-management course where participants study different aspects of self-management, building on the foundation of self-awareness and self-regulation, and especially in the context of interpersonal relationships, character strength, and personal values and purpose.

Is the EMBA right for your leadership journey?

You have already proven you can deliver results. The question the EMBA asks is a harder one: can you understand, and change, the leader behind those results? The right programme will not hand you a leadership identity – it will give you the tools, the structure, the expert guidance, and the peers to build one that is authentically yours. That takes effort. It takes honesty. And for most who commit to it, it turns out to be among the most valuable investments of their professional lives. Are you ready?

If you’d like to explore which programmes offer the kind of leadership development described here, join a Premier EMBA event to connect with alumni and admissions directors directly.

Originally published: 22 February 2019

Updated: 24 April 2026