The Listening Leader: A Program Review

Abstract

This capstone project evaluates the effectiveness of a new leadership development program at Helping Hands Family Autism Services (HHF). Launched in January 2025, the program aims to enhance the competencies of Board Certified Behavior Analysts (BCBAs) in active listening and trust-building to improve their relationships with Registered Behavior Technicians (RBTs). The study utilizes the Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) framework to assess the impact of the training on listening quality, supervisory satisfaction, job satisfaction, and retention rates among RBTs. The evaluation employs a mixed-methods approach, combining quantitative surveys and qualitative interviews across four clinics—two serving as intervention sites and two as control sites. Key findings indicate that improved listening skills among BCBAs lead to higher satisfaction with supervisors and reduced turnover in the intervention clinic. However, job satisfaction is influenced more by factors such as compensation and peer relationships than by supervisory behavior alone. The study underscores the importance of consistent implementation and the role of peer support in enhancing job satisfaction and retention. Based on these findings, the project recommends reconfiguring the learning framework to be competency-based, institutionalizing peer communities of practice, ensuring full implementation of leadership programs, expanding key leadership behaviors organization-wide, redesigning workload systems to align with motivational drivers, and institutionalizing listening as a core competency across clinical operations.