Leadership in Times of Disruption

MIA & MPA Leadership and Management II Core. This is a seven-week course designed to equip participants with the skills and knowledge to effectively lead and manage teams, especially during times of great change. The course concepts will be broadly applicable to all disciplines and sectors, and will showcase examples from the nonprofit/social impact sectors, as well as practices popularized by Big Tech companies and other startups as they've rapidly grown and disrupted industries in the last decades. The first premise of the course is that successful leadership and management involve the deft application of frameworks, research, and best practices, but also deep self-awareness of one’s own strengths, weaknesses, biases, and emotional triggers. Throughout the course, we look to develop the emotional strength and open-ended mindset required for leadership while practicing the specific research-backed skills and behaviors that get the most out of teams. The second premise of this course is to carefully deconstruct “leadership” into its many forms, including driving impact, creating transformation, and managing people and teams. Each is encompassed in “leadership,” but requires different skills and focus to succeed. This course will be interactive and will involve the creation of a hypothetical social enterprise, nonprofit, or new program within an existing organization, which we will use to teach concepts first-hand. As a class, we will co-create several projects for this hypothetical organization, including a draft strategic plan, annual goals, and job descriptions. The goal is for students to see the transformation of “good enough” deliverables into spectacular ones, building a base of knowledge and experience to take into the next stage of their careers.