Meeting/Event Information
March 18, 2026 Breakfast Meeting
March 18, 2026
8:00 AM - 9:45 AM
Hilton St. Louis Frontenac
1335 S. Lindbergh Blvd.
St. Louis, MO 63131
Venue website
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Overcoming Leadership Debt: How HR Leaders Build Leadership Maturity to Drive Business Performance
Presented by:
Lauren Cohen, JC, PCC
Cohen Leadership Group
As organizations grow, many unknowingly accumulate Leadership Debt - the hidden cost of growth outpacing the leadership systems that align people, priorities, and execution. While companies invest heavily in technology, structure, and process, far less attention is paid to whether leadership maturity is evolving alongside the business.
This session introduces a Leadership Maturity Model that reframes leadership effectiveness as a business system, not an HR program or training initiative. Designed for senior HR leaders, the talk explores how leadership debt begins with executive team misalignment, compounds through under-equipped senior leaders, and ultimately shows up as overwhelmed managers, inconsistent communication, and stalled execution.
Participants will examine why organizations often invert the leadership maturity sequence - focusing first on manager training rather than executive team alignment - and why this approach consistently produces a limited return. Through real-world case examples from fast-growing companies, attendees will learn how HR can partner with executive leadership to strengthen leadership maturity in the correct order: aligned executive teams, equipped executive leaders, and skilled managers - followed by communication, culture, and change readiness.
This session equips HR leaders with a practical framework and business-language tools to diagnose leadership debt, make the case for systemic leadership investment, and partner more effectively with executive leadership to drive enterprise performance.
Learning Objectives:
- Define leadership debt and explain how it develops when leadership systems fail to evolve alongside business growth.
- Describe how leadership debt compounds and cascades from executive team misalignment into managerial strain, communication breakdowns, and organizational execution drag.
- Apply a Leadership Maturity Model to identify the correct sequence for building leadership capacity in growing organizations.
- Explain why executive team alignment must precede manager development to achieve sustainable performance and return on investment.
- Position HR as a strategic partner to the business by using leadership maturity and leadership debt frameworks to influence executive decision-making and enterprise outcomes.
This session equips HR leaders to move beyond program delivery and serve as strategic advisors who help the business strengthen leadership maturity, reduce execution risk, and support sustainable, scalable growth.
Lauren Cohen, JC, PCC, has spent her entire career helping leaders solve business and people problems. With a passion for entrepreneurship and an obsession for bringing out the best in people, she brings a unique blend of coaching, leadership consulting, business strategy, and thought partnership. Her special sauce is seeing the un-seeable, asking powerful questions, expanding energy, and creating collaborative partnerships to leverage improbable results.
Lauren is a ICF Certified Professional Coach (PCC) and has extensive training and certification in leadership and teams. She also holds certifications in the Hogan Personality Inventory, EQi-2.0 (Emotional Intelligence), Energy Leadership Index Assessment (ELI-MP), Six Team Conditions/Team Diagnostic Survey (TDS), and performs comprehensive 360 stakeholder assessments. Prior to launching Cohen Leadership Group, Lauren was a business litigation attorney. She holds a B.S. and a J.D. from Washington University in St. Louis. Lauren draws on her experience as a trial lawyer, problem-solver, and business advisor in her coaching and consulting practice.
Lauren is a paradox of all things: extroverted introvert, free spirited achiever, hyper-rational empath. She brings edge and love in equal measure. She loves deep conversation, wandering in a new city, yoga, coffee, reading, concert-going, stargazing, and loving on her family.
Schedule
8:00 am - Breakfast & Networking
8:30 am - 9:45 am - Keynote Presentation
Fees
SHRM St. Louis Chapter Member - Included in Dues
Non-Chapter Member - $50
Thank You to Our Meeting Sponsor!
Tickets
$0.00 SHRM St. Louis Chapter Member
$50.00 Non-Chapter Member
