AdVance LeadershipDr. Garland & Dorothy Wood Vance
For the CEO of a growing company

Develop the Team
Your Vision Deserves

Your company's needs have outpaced your team's development. No one has shown you how to close that gap.

Get the mindset and tools to lead at the level your vision demands.

Start Assessment 16 questions, 3 minutes. No sales conversation until you ask for one.
Dr. Garland Vance and Dorothy Wood Vance

Named a Top Leadership Development Company by HR Tech Outlook.

The Leadership Gap

You've upgraded your company's operations but not the people leading it.

You've invested in efficiency. A business operating system. Automation. Better equipment. Faster processes. Those investments are working. You'd never let any of them sit untouched.

Now picture your company three years from today. A faster operation in the hands of the same leaders hasn't removed the pressure. In fact, it's put more pressure on them. When they couldn't carry it, it landed back on you. Systems don't run a company. People do.

You've spent years upgrading the operation while leadership capability stagnated. When those two stop growing at the same rate, the operation outruns the people responsible for running it. We call that The Leadership Gap.

Operational Capability Leadership Capability THE LEADERSHIP GAP Today Year 2 Year 3

The wider the gap grows, the more it costs you:

  • Decisions take longer
  • Silos widen
  • The strategy outruns the people carrying it
  • Your vision stalls

As the CEO, you feel it every day. The people on your Executive Team excel in their lanes but you're the only one who sees the whole road. So you referee. You translate between departments. You explain, again, how one team's decision affects everyone else.

The vision stalls because you're the person who holds it, but you're too busy holding your leadership team together.

Your Executive Team is LEASHED.

Why your Executive Team is leashed

Your Executive Team members got promoted for excelling at the work.

They weren't developed to lead the work.

Four out of five leaders received a promotion without any training for their new role. They were promoted because they performed. Then they were handed a title that came with people and budgets and told to figure out the rest.

Their responsibilities have outgrown their current abilities. That is a leashed leader. When an Executive Team is leashed, the whole company gets held back.

Your team should be ready for the company you're building. Not just the one you have.

0%

are "accidental leaders" — promoted for technical ability, never trained for the role.

0%

of the variance in employee engagement ties directly to the manager.

0%

of companies doubt their current leaders can carry the organization into the future.

Events vs. A Proven Path

Events inspire your leaders. A proven path develops them.

Developing a leader isn't an event or a moment of inspiration. It's a pathway, reinforced by conversations, mindsets, and practical tools.

Almost everything offered to your Executive Team so far has been the opposite: an event.

  • A keynote that moved people for a week.
  • A book everyone received and three people read.
  • A conference that sent leaders home inspired and alone.

Every one of those is an event. Events inspire leaders, but their power wears off after a few days. A business doesn't grow in events. It grows every day, in hundreds of decisions your Executive Team makes and actions they take.

You already know what actually works, because you've done it everywhere else. Your operation got better because you gave it a sequence, a cadence, and accountability. Your Executive Team has never been given the same thing — so they stay leashed.

If nothing changes

Your Executive Team stays leashed, your vision stays stalled, and you stay stuck in the middle.

Three years from now, your systems are humming, but your Executive Team is exactly where it is today. And you're still the one holding everything together. Your best managers get tired of waiting and leave. The strategy gets decided in the conference room and never reaches the floor. The culture you dream of stays trapped in your head.

None of it shows up as a leadership problem on the P&L. It shows up as turnover, missed numbers, and a CEO who can't step away. And when you finally need this team to carry something big, they can't.

Your guide

You know where you want your company to go, but your leadership team
avoids the hard conversations.

Dr. Garland Vance and Dorothy Wood Vance

Dr. Garland Vance & Dorothy Wood Vance

We understand the frustration of feeling like you've got to carry it all and facing constant leadership challenges. We've spent over 25 years across the table from leaders like you, who could see exactly where the company needed to go and needed an Executive Team who could take it there. We discovered what actually develops leaders rather than what merely inspires them.

Over 25 years

Developing leadership teams in a wide variety of industries—manufacturing, distribution, service, hospitality, and beyond—across the U.S. and Canada.

The Best in Leadership Development

Named one of the top leadership development companies by HR Tech Outlook.

Seven issues

Our research finds seven issues cause 95% of the leadership challenges in any organization. Address all seven and your team can carry the strategy.

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Dr. Garland Vance and Dorothy Wood Vance on the cover of HR Tech Outlook, Leadership Development Edition 2024

Featured on the cover of HR Tech Outlook's Top Leadership Development Companies.

Some companies we've worked with

Chick-fil-A Orkin Orkin Canada Red Stag Fulfillment Clark Pest Control University of Tennessee, Knoxville
21st Mortgage Northwest Exterminating Kelsan Builders FirstSource Crystal Window & Door Axle Logistics
The proof

When your leadership team grows
your company grows.

We've witnessed success stories for over 25 years. Here are two.

Strong leaders with strong opinions learned how to make decisions together.

Where they were stuck

Sales, operations, finance, and HR each ran like its own company, and none of them accounted for how their work landed on the others. The CEO wanted to sell within two years and knew his Executive Team was the one thing standing between the company and a clean sale.

What the team built

They built trust first, then wrote their own operating principles for how they would work together, including one principle on how they would discuss, debate, and decide. Writing those principles forced them to collaborate, disagree, and land on an answer, which was something they had never been able to do.

How the team leads now

They argue hard and land the decision in the room, and the decision holds. Each leader checks how a call lands on the other departments before making it. The CEO is no longer the tiebreaker.

The company sold for 2.5 times its expected valuation.

On day one, a team member told us he had no interest in changing what he was already doing. By the end of the first day, he said, "I've known a lot of 'leadership experts' in my life. You all are the first ones I will listen to."

Each leader ran their own department as though it were a company of its own.

Where they were stuck

The team competed against each other instead of collaborating. They blamed each other when plans didn't work. Nobody was accountable for the whole.

What the team built

The leaders came together multiple times over a year to grow in clarity and trust. They started helping each other and shaping a culture together rather than defending their own corners.

How the team leads now

Leaders across the business share one language for leadership, so a problem gets described the same way in two different places. They back each other across the business instead of guarding turf. A leader running one part of the company will hand work to a leader running another without being told to.

As the leaders started working together, the company grew from $1.8 billion to $3.76 billion.

Year one, a respected team member asked, "Do you mean we're supposed to care about these people?" Today, working together is simply how they lead.

I've used Unleashed Leadership throughout two manufacturing organizations — from executives to plant managers to frontline supervisors. The leadership strategies are grounded, usable, and built for the real demands of day-to-day operations. The tools show up in conversations, decisions, and growth across the business.

Jeffrey S. · 2x Manufacturing CEO

I've had the Unleashed Leadership framework taped to my desk for years — and for good reason. It has shaped how our leadership team approaches the daily challenges of leading people. It's practical, powerful, and deeply relevant.

Rob Q. · President, national commercial pest control brand

This is truly next level leadership at its finest. I have advanced my skills to a level beyond what I thought was possible. Garland and Dorothy pave a clear path for how leaders lead and lead other leaders. My team now sees the results and impact of the leadership skills I've practiced because of their direction. They helped build a high-performance team.

Chris B. · Leadership Team Member
The two paths

Two Paths to Transform Your Team

The Transformation Path

Who This is For: Anyone who can check one or more of these boxes:
  • Your company is growing fast.
  • Your company has just been acquired.
  • Your company is building toward a sale.
  • You've recently been hired as CEO.

What This Path Looks Like: Your team meets with us live one day each quarter. Each session introduces ridiculously practical Unleashed Leadership tools that unlock the skills of every person on your team and accelerate their ability to work together. Your team develops new practices, engages in the conversations they've been avoiding, and starts carrying the vision forward.

The Breakthrough Path

Who This is For: Your company and leadership team feel stuck, and you're not sure what to do.

What This Path Looks Like: Customized entirely around your company, we diagnose which of the seven issues are leashing your Executive Team. We design meetings and gatherings around those issues. These include:

  • Deep dives with each team member
  • Training focused on your organization's specific situation
  • Working within your team's natural strengths and preferences
The plan

Three Steps to an Unleashed Leadership Team

1

Take the Assessment

16 questions, 3 minutes. Get your Leadership Team Score to see where your team stands.

2

Discovery Session

30 minutes. Explore the path to unleash your team.

3

Choose Your Plan

Select the best path to unleash your team and move the company forward.

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What your leadership team can do a year from now

Both paths lead to the same place. Here is what it looks like.

How your team is today: How your team operates in 1 year:
Every decision lands back on your desk. The team decides and commits in the room.
Conversations after the meeting sabotage your decisions. The team discusses and debates during the meeting.
Each leader protects their own department. Each leader thinks about the whole company first.
You re-explain the strategy at every level. A manager two levels down can name the plan and their part in it.
When something slips, the team looks for others to blame. The team owns the outcome together and fixes it.
Employees are dissatisfied with their boss. Leaders invest in and keep your people.
The business can't run without you. You take a vacation while nothing stalls.
Before you start

What CEOs ask before they start

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The transformation

Your Executive Team is unleashed.
So is your vision.

When your leadership team grows the whole company does, too. The team leads instead of just working. The company pulls together instead of apart. And the weight comes off you.

In meetings. Your leaders walk into the room excited to collaborate, so meetings are productive, not dramatic. Difficult conversations happen without anyone getting defensive. When a decision gets made, they commit and stick to it.

Across the business. The silos come down because everyone is working from your vision. Leaders in different locations and departments work together to solve the same problems. Work moves forward without interpersonal friction.

For you. Problems stop escalating to you unnecessarily. You stop refereeing the silly squabbles. You take vacation without calls that pull you back in. You stop carrying the whole weight of the company and get to lead it forward.

"I'm not the only one carrying this anymore."

— what CEOs tell us a year in.

Start here

Find out how leashed your team is.

Take the Leadership Gap Assessment. 16 questions, 3 minutes. You'll get a Leadership Team Score and a conversation if you want one.

Start Assessment

Not ready to talk yet? Get the 7 Issues That Leash Your Leadership Team — a short guide and video on the seven issues behind 95% of leadership challenges. Share it with your whole team.

Unleashed Leadership by Dr. Garland Vance and Dorothy Wood Vance
The book

Seven issues leash nearly every leader. Here's how to solve them.

Unleashed Leadership, free in two formats.

Every leader on your team eventually hits the point where their responsibilities outgrow the abilities. In that moment, they need to diagnose what's holding them back and discern how to get unleashed. This book gives you both: the seven issues behind 95% of leadership challenges, and the tools to solve each one. Pick the format that fits your week.

Free gift

The full audiobook

The whole book, read by Garland and Dorothy. Listen on the drive between locations. Just tell us where to send it.

Send me the audiobook
Short on time

The summary

The seven issues and the tools for each, in under 5 minutes. Sent straight to your inbox.

Send me the summary

Or Buy the Book →

When a leader gets unleashed, they unleash everything around them.