The Surprising Way Leadership Behaviors Go Viral at Work

Why developing leaders at scale creates safer, more innovative organizations

Think about the last viral trend you saw online—a meme, a TikTok dance, a clever phrase. Within days, sometimes hours, it spreads across networks, workplaces, and dinner table conversations. Contagion is powerful.

But not everything that goes viral is silly or destructive. In organizations, leadership behaviors can spread just as quickly. When leaders consistently model openness, respect, and accountability, those behaviors ripple outward. Direct reports adopt them, peers mirror them, and over time, an entire culture shifts.

What begins as individual growth becomes collective transformation. And perhaps the most valuable thing that spreads is psychological safety—the belief that people can speak up, take risks, and innovate without fear.

Who is Leadership Development for?

Historically, leadership development was focused on specific individuals. The development processes were designed for and targeted to one person.  Much of leadership development is centered on the most senior people in an organization.

Some organizations expanded that view and designed “high potential” programs, increasing the number of people involved. The most senior leaders usually selected the participants. The primary selection criterion was the perceived long-term potential for these individuals to advance to the most senior positions within the firm.

An entirely different approach and mindset about leadership development would be to focus on simultaneously developing every leader, at every level, and in every functional arena. We know that sounds far-fetched. You would assume that the economies of that would be beyond the reach of most organizations. This article contends that the target is not only attainable, but the outcome is probable if the organization uses three reasonable actions.

Three Actions That Make Leadership Development Go Viral

1. Use proven methods that actually change behavior.
   Too many leadership programs rely on one-off workshops, inspirational talks, or trust-falls in the woods. These may be entertaining, but they rarely stick. The methods that do work are grounded in research and involve sustained practice, such as:

• 360-degree feedback
• Coaching and mentoring
• Facilitated business simulations
• Skill building with practice and feedback
• Action learning projects
• Development plans anchored in objective assessments

These approaches don’t just teach; they transform. They give leaders the chance to practice new behaviors, reflect on feedback, and improve over time.

2. Focus on a reasonable scale.
   Scaling doesn’t mean training thousands of leaders at once. It means steadily reaching groups that are large enough to shift culture. In one organization of 7,000 employees, involving just 100 leaders per year, the program produced dramatic ripple effects across the company.
3. Make it long-term and sustained.
   Culture doesn’t change in a weekend. Organizations that commit to multi-year leadership initiatives send a clear message: leadership development is not a passing fad. It is an expectation. Long-term continuity holds leaders accountable, builds momentum, and reinforces that the organization is serious about growth.

What Happens When Leaders Change

When organizations take this approach, three outcomes consistently emerge:

1. Leaders improve—measurably.
   Multi-rater assessments confirm that most participants make real behavioral gains. On average, colleagues see measurable improvements across more than half the skills assessed.
2. Their teams improve, too.
   Surprisingly, the positive changes don’t stop with participants. Direct reports also show measurable improvements in their own behavior and effectiveness. Leaders modeling openness, curiosity, and respect create safer environments—and teams naturally respond in kind.
3. The culture shifts.
   Perhaps the most striking finding is that, in multi-year studies, each new wave of leaders entered development programs already performing at a higher level than their predecessors. Without direct intervention, their baseline behavior improved by nearly 20 percentile points. The explanation? Leadership behaviors had become contagious. Colleagues observed how respected leaders treated others, solved problems, and fostered psychological safety—and adopted those same behaviors themselves.

Why This Matters

Psychological safety—the belief that people can speak up, admit mistakes, and take risks without fear—is one of the strongest predictors of innovation and team performance. But it doesn’t appear out of thin air. It is cultivated through countless daily interactions, modeled most powerfully by leaders.

If toxic behaviors can poison an organization, then positive leadership behaviors can heal and strengthen it. Developing leaders at scale isn’t just about helping individuals grow. It’s about creating a cultural “herd immunity” where great leadership becomes the norm, not the exception.

The Challenge for Organizations

Leadership development should no longer be viewed as a luxury for the few. It is a scalable, contagious force that—if approached with proven methods, sustained effort, and organizational commitment—reshapes culture and drives long-term performance.

Bottom line: great leadership is contagious. The question is, will your organization allow it to spread?