How to best address the professional learning needs of those aspiring to leadership roles in schools is a crucial issue. Robust evaluation practices are needed to determine the quality of current provisions and to identify where improvements can be made. This paper considers the quality of professional learning programmes using a set of 10 criteria distilled from a synthesis of compelling international leadership learning research. We show the potential of the 10 criteria for judging the quality of professional learning programmes by applying them to examples of programmes drawn from five countries around the world. These examples provide a launching pad from which questions can be posed about the potential use and applicability of such criteria in making design decisions about the quality and value of professional learning programmes in a range of national and international contexts.