Purpose: This paper aims to examine the moderating role of cultural similarity between leaders and followers on leadership training effectiveness in terms of followers' fairness perception and organizational citizenship behavior. Design/methodology/approach: A quasi-experiment was conducted with 40 managers from international corporations as the subjects. The 40 subjects were equally assigned to a treatment group and a control group. In each group, half share similar backgrounds with the followers while the other half do not. Leadership training was offered to managers in the treatment group, but not to those in the control group. Findings: Results show that leadership training has positive effects on followers' fairness perception and organizational citizenship behavior, and the effects are stronger for those leaders who are similar to their followers in cultural background. Research limitations/implications: The study further supports that followers' fairness perception and organizational citizenship behavior will be enhanced if their leaders receive proper leadership training, and it is the first to demonstrate that cultural similarity between leaders and followers plays an important role in influencing leadership training effectiveness. Practical implications: The training program described in this study is straightforward, inexpensive, easy to implement, and can be used by organizations with a diverse workforce to improve their training effectiveness and facilitate their leaders' managerial efforts. Originality/value: This is the first paper to examine how cultural similarity between leaders and followers influences leadership training effectiveness. (Contains 1 figure and 4 tables.)