Since 2003, the Ken Blanchard Companies Corporate Issues Survey has been tracking business, management, and employee development needs and issues of organizations. This year 1,091 members of the training and HR communities the world over, randomly selected from the Blanchard database, responded to the survey, including questions that asked them to think ahead to how their needs and issues may change by 2010.

According to the survey, 76% of responding HR professionals and 59% of Top Management ranked developing potential leaders as the current top management challenge. Within the next three years, however, respondents believe that this issue will be eclipsed by the more pressing need to focus on selection and retention of key talent.

So, what does this shift mean for those of us in the business of leadership development?

Frankly, I don't think it means much at all. As practitioners of The Leadership Challenge, we take a wide approach to leadership-Five Practices wide. We believe that leaders Model the Way through their actions. We believe they Inspire a Shared Vision throughout their organizations. We believe they Challenge the Process by finding new ways of doing things with great success. We believe they Enable Others to Act by giving their constituents the groundwork they need to succeed. We believe they Encourage the Heart by celebrating the success of their organization and its constituents.

This comprehensive approach allows leaders to see the big picture and their place in it. And the big picture encompasses all sorts of opportunities and challenges, including those mentioned in the Blanchard Survey: selecting and retaining key talent, creating an engaged workforce, customer loyalty, reducing costs, succession planning, employee flexibility/responsiveness, and increasing innovation. Leaders versed in the Five Practices regularly meet such challenges with aplomb. For example, good leaders engage the workforce by enlisting their ideas for a common vision. In short, leadership development is not just about development; it's about retention and engagement and all sorts of organizational challenges.

So as leadership practitioners, we merely need to take a dose of our own medicine. We will meet the challenge of proving that leadership is still tops by showing our clients that the answers to their toughest questions all lay within a world-class leadership development program.

Marisa Holland Kelley is a Senior Editorial Assistant for Pfeiffer, an Imprint of Wiley. She works on The Leadership Challenge® franchise and recently observed The Leadership Challenge® Workshop in Sonoma.