Introducing key leadership competencies tailored for professionals without formal supervisory authority. Instructor Natalya Bah presents a framework grounded in the U.S. Office of Personnel Management’s updated Executive Core Qualifications to help non-supervisors develop and apply essential leadership skills.
Key Insights
- Defines leadership beyond formal titles by emphasizing how non-supervisors can influence teams through self-awareness and peer development.
- Aligns core skills—including accountability, strategic thinking, and resilience—with OPM’s Executive Core Qualifications to ensure relevance to public sector leadership expectations.
- Uses the DISC behavioral assessment to help participants understand their dominant styles and apply that knowledge across eight structured modules focused on practical skill application.
This lesson is a preview from our Leadership Skills for Non-Supervisors Course and Leadership training courses. Enroll in this course for detailed lessons, live instructor support, and project-based training.
Welcome to Leadership Skills for Non-Supervisors. My name is Natalya Bah, and I’ll be your instructor for this course. I want to start by reviewing the course learning objectives and what we want you to take away from this experience.
First, we’ll review what leadership means when you’re not in a formal leadership position. What roles can non-supervisors play, and how can they flex their leadership skills? The second learning outcome focuses on core behavioral styles. We need to understand ourselves and our natural tendencies before we can begin developing additional skills for ourselves and others.
We’ll use the DISC self-assessment to better understand and identify your dominant behavioral style. We’ll then explore how these styles influence the workplace. After that, we’ll cover four major groupings of skills.
The first skill area is developing others. We’ll discuss how leaders, even those without supervisory authority, can help others grow through peer coaching, mentoring, and providing constructive feedback.
The second topic focuses on personal accountability. We’ll examine how to take ownership of our work, whether in collaborative projects, team settings, or individual assignments, and how to encourage accountability among peers. The third core skill we’ll address is strengthening strategic thinking.
We’ll practice connecting daily tasks to the organization’s larger goals and mission, helping ourselves stay strategically focused while guiding others to adopt that same perspective. The fourth skill set involves agility and resilience. We’ll explore why these traits are essential, how to develop them, and how they help us and our colleagues respond effectively to stress and change.
By the end of the course, you should come away with an integrated leadership mindset, not just thinking about each skill separately but learning to use them together to become a stronger leader as a non-supervisor. Finally, you’ll reflect on what you’ve learned and create a personal leadership development plan.
So why these topics? Why these specific skills? There are many leadership competencies out there, but this course aligns with the Office of Personnel Management’s updated Executive Core Qualifications (ECQs).
A recent OPM memo updated these ECQs, and we chose to align our focus with that framework. Under the topic of “Leading Change,” we’ll cover agility and resilience. Under “Leading People,” we’ll explore accountability and developing others. And under “Results Driven,” we’ll focus on strategic thinking. By emphasizing these areas, we ensure our curriculum aligns with OPM’s latest leadership standards.
The course includes eight modules. We’ll begin with Module 1: Welcome and Setting the Stage. Module 2 focuses on understanding yourself through the DISC assessment. Module 3 covers developing others. Module 4 addresses accountability. Module 5 focuses on strategic thinking.
Module 6 explores agility and resilience. Module 7 integrates all the skills together, and Module 8 concludes the course with reflection and closure.
