The future of leadership is here-and-now: why vertical development demands immersive learning

“You can’t become a better swimmer by reading about backstroke.”
— someone who’s nearly drowned in a leadership role

The world isn’t just changing. It’s outpacing us.

The leaders of today are under pressure to navigate relentless complexity, deep ambiguity, polarised teams, sweeping system-wide change — yet most leadership development still clings to the notion of providing more tools rather than helping them to build more capacity.

That’s the difference between horizontal and vertical development. And this is why immersive learning is no longer a nice-to-have — it’s a necessity.

Horizontal vs. Vertical Development: what’s the difference?

In Leadership Development, personal growth can take on two distinct forms: vertical and horizontal. 

• Horizontal development is about what you know — helping leaders gain more knowledge, skills and experience across different areas.
  
• Vertical development is about how you make sense of the world — expanding your awareness, mindset and ability to deal with uncertainty, complexity, and contradiction.

As leading Developmental Psychologist Robert Kegan puts it:

Horizontal learning is like pouring more water into the same glass — you’re adding more knowledge, skills, and tools, but the container (your underlying mindset or way of making meaning) stays the same.

Vertical development, on the other hand, is like transforming the shape of the glass itself — expanding your capacity to hold, process, and make sense of greater complexity.

In other words:

• Horizontal = more content
• Vertical = a bigger container

Kegan’s glass analogy shows us that although horizontal learning can be useful, it eventually hits a limit. If your glass is too small, it doesn’t matter how much water (information or skills) you pour in — it will eventually overflow or go to waste.

In a world of growing complexity, horizontal learning is no longer enough. Leaders need vertical development—which is about transforming how they think, not just what they know.

There’s a key reason why The Center for Creative Leadership nominates vertical development as one of the key future trends for Leadership Development.

Most leadership training keeps pouring more water into the same glass. But today’s challenges demand a bigger glass — a new way of thinking, not just more things to think about.

Vertical development is  what enables leaders to move from being experts to systems thinkers, from reacting to reflecting, from control to complexity.

But here’s the catch: vertical development can’t be taught.
It has to be experienced.

Real growth needs more than slides: why experiential learning is the gateway to vertical development

David A. Kolb’s experiential learning theory makes one thing clear: real development doesn’t transpire through just content delivery – it happens through transformation. Kolb shows us that learning is a dynamic cycle of action, reflection, feedback, and experimentation. It’s not about absorbing information,  it’s about evolving through lived experience.

And that’s exactly what vertical development demands.

Where traditional learning (horizontal development) adds new skills and knowledge within your current way of thinking, vertical development changes the way you think altogether. It’s about growing your internal capacity to handle complexity, ambiguity, and the tough human challenges of leadership.

Experiential Learning is the engine of vertical development. Why?

Here’s why….

• Forces leaders to confront their assumptions — not just learn new ones
  
• Pushes leaders into unfamiliar, unpredictable terrain — where there’s no playbook
  
• Generates the discomfort that is necessary for growth — the kind you can’t get in a classroom
  
• Demands integration — not just absorption — connecting insight to action, theory to identity
  

Traditional workshops can’t provide this. Put simply, you don’t develop new capacities by watching Powerpoint. You need situations, not slides.

To develop future leaders who can navigate the real world — complexity ambiguity, conflict, change, and paradox — we need to get them out of their heads and into immersive experiences that challenge who they are, not just what they know.

Why immersive learning environments make it possible

Let’s be honest — the workplace is not a safe place to fail forward.

You can’t  walk into your next exec meeting and “try on” a new mindset or experiment with vulnerability in front of your board. The risks are real. The stakes are high.

That’s exactly why immersive learning environments are essential for vertical development.

At Living Systems, we design and build simulated — yet psychologically real — spaces where leaders can engage, experiment, and evolve in ways that the workplace doesn’t usually allow. These environments create the space for something deeper than skill-building. They open the door to transformation.

Through our Immersive Development Journeys (IDJs), leaders can:

• Navigate complex, emotionally charged scenarios that mirror real-world pressure
  
• Try out new behaviours, mindsets and perspectives — without real-world consequences
  
• Receive immediate, personalised feedback that deepens insight
  
• Pause and reflect in real time — not just afterwards
  
• Expand their cognitive and emotional range, building the capacity to lead in uncertainty
  

This is the space where vertical movement takes root — where leaders move beyond asking “What should I do?” and start asking more powerful questions, such as: “How am I seeing this situation and framing the problem?”

It’s not about acting differently. It’s about being different. And that kind of shift doesn’t happen in a seminar. It happens in immersive, transformational experiences that challenge the core of how we think, feel, and lead.

Traditional workshops can’t provide this. Put simply, you don’t develop new capacities by watching Powerpoint. You need situations, not slides.

To develop future leaders who can navigate the real world — complexity ambiguity, conflict, change, and paradox — we need to get them out of their heads and into immersive experiences that challenge who they are, not just what they know.

Not roleplay. Reality. Why immersive environments drive vertical growth

Our environments aren’t built for acting — they’re built for activating.
They’re designed to push people into deep, full-body participation: emotionally, socially, and intellectually. In these spaces, there’s no script. Just the raw complexity of human systems.

Immersive learning environments demand more than performance. They call for transformation. 

They demand:

• Sensemaking over certainty — the ability to navigate ambiguity, not just execute a plan
  
• Curiosity over control — letting go of having the answer to stay open to deeper questions
  
• Presence over performance — tuning into the moment rather than defaulting to old roles

These are not typical learning experiences. Rather, these environments are intentionally designed, scaffolded, and carefully facilitated to support risk, reflection, and real-time growth. 

Think of them as the altitude training of leadership development: Challenging. Uncomfortable. But radically transformative.

This is where vertical development happens — not by adding more tools, but by reshaping how leaders see themselves, others, and the systems they lead.

The outcome? Leaders who think differently

Leaders who go through immersive experiences don’t just leave with new tools. They leave transformed. They’re not just better equipped.

They’re different thinkers.

• They’ve begun to unlearn old patterns, not just layer on new ones.They’re more at ease with ambiguity and complexity, rather than chasing quick answers.
  
• They ask bolder more generative questions, instead of defaulting to solutions.
  
• They notice more — in themselves and in the system around them.
  

That’s what vertical development looks like in practice.
And it doesn’t come from being told what to do. It comes from being stretched, challenged, and invited into experiences that shift the frame — not just fill it.

Because real growth doesn’t just add.

It transforms.

Ready to grow your mind — not just your toolkit?

At Living Systems, we don’t just hand out answers to future leaders. We create transformative experiences that help leaders build their mental and emotional capacity – so they can navigate complexity with agility, awareness and depth.

Because in today’s world, knowing more isn’t enough.

You need to be more.
You need to see differently, think differently, and be different.

That’s vertical development. It doesn’t stop when the experience ends — it’s a continuous journey of seeing more, asking better questions, and leading with greater depth.

Transformation starts here…

The future belongs to organisations that unlock the power of Collective Intelligence — feeling, thinking, and acting as one. Are you ready to build that capacity? Start the conversation with us.