Results for OB

This course introduces you to the structures and processes that affect group performance and highlights some of the common pitfalls associated with working in teams. Topics include team culture, fostering creativity and coordination, making group decisions, and dealing with a variety of personalities. You will participate in a number of group exercises to illustrate principles of teamwork and to give you practice not only diagnosing team problems but also taking action to improve total team performance.

Building on the discipline of social psychology, this course helps you cultivate mindsets and build skills to understand the ways in which organizations and their members affect one another. You will learn frameworks for diagnosing and resolving problems in organizational settings. The course relates theory and research to organizational problems by reviewing basic concepts such as individual motivation and behavior; decision making; interpersonal communication and influence; small group behavior; and dyadic, individual, and inter-group conflict and cooperation.

This course is designed to introduce incoming students to the structures and processes that affect group performance as well as some of the common pitfalls associated with working in teams. Topics include understanding team culture, fostering creativity and coordination, making group decisions, and dealing with a variety of personalities. Students will participate in a number of group exercises designed to illustrate principles of team work and to give students practice diagnosing team problems and taking action to improve team performance.

Family-controlled private and public companies are the dominant form of enterprise worldwide, comprising more than 90% of all businesses. They are currently undergoing intense competitive transition in form and function and more than three trillion dollars of assets will change generational management during the next ten years. This course is designed for those persons who desire to understand the distinct strategies and practices of family-controlled companies and family wealth management. It will focus on shareholder decision-making; financial and market-driven options for long-run competitiveness, organizational structures, and management team issues; transition planning for the corporate entity, family dynamics and communication issues; and leadership empowerment. The course is intended for those who plan to consult or provide professional services to closely-held companies and for those contemplating a career in a family firm. It will present both a theoretical framework for understanding the family form of business organization and a practice perspective on consulting to family firms and/or working as a family member in the family business. Each class will be comprised of two elements: a case-based discussion that explores family business frameworks, and a visitor session in which a family business practitioner describes their own experiences and engages in Q&A with students. This unusual blend of pedagogies is designed to provide students with both the theory and practice of family businesses in an engaging and enriching way.

This two-quarter course is offered for 6 units and runs for the Winter and Spring Quarters. Both quarters must be completed to receive any units of credit. THERE IS BOTH A PREQUALIFICATION AND A PRE/CO REQUISITE for this course. It is open to a maximum of 24 MBA2s who have passed an assessment of their potential to coach effectively, though they need not have been coached as first years. (The number of students may be increased to 36 if sufficient first-year coachees are identified.) The pre/co-requisite is OB 374-Interpersonal Dynamics or OB 393-Leadership in Diverse Organizations. (If taken as a co-requisite, OB 374 must be taken in the winter quarter.nn nnThere will be a reading list of conceptual material which will be supplemented during class with lectures and discussions. Students will have the opportunity to apply those concepts through role-playing and exercises during class time. Each MBA2 will be assigned three MBA1s. The MBA2 coaches will meet with their MBA1s five times each quarter in a series of semi-structured coaching activities. In addition, the MBA2 students will meet, in groups of 6, with a Master Coach for a two-hour clinic every other Friday during the Winter Quarter. During Spring Quarter, students will meet every Monday (only) from 3:15 to 5:00 pm (alternating between class and clinics) with two additional Friday classes to be held on Friday April 3 and Friday April 17 from 3:15 to 5:00. nnnNote: Students MUST attend the first class (including waitlisted) or they will be dropped. The drop deadline for this course is Thursday, January 8 at noon (i.e. earlier than standard GSB add/drop deadline).

What does it mean to be a principled leader? What role do values play in an organization, and how do successful leaders apply their values in their daily business lives? This course examines the concept of principled leadership and the various ways that leaders try to institutionalize particular values within the organizations they lead. Equally important, it explores the difficult challenges that leaders sometimes face when trying to apply their principles in a tough, fast-paced business environment, where others may not share the same expectations. Through assigned readings, interactive lectures with visiting executives, and weekly small group discussions, students will learn how practicing leaders implement their principles, while reflecting the realities of different cultural expectations and meeting business demands. The course will provide a forum for students to learn directly from practicing leaders and to think introspectively about their own personal values, leadership styles, and long-term aspirations.

Having a good idea is not enough, we must also be able to convey our ideas in a way that people can understand and act on them. But often our messages don't persuade or persist. This course assumes that we can craft more effective messages by understanding the principles that make certain ideas stick in the natural social environment: Urban legends survive in the social marketplace without advertising dollars to support them or PR professionals to spin them. How could we make true or useful information survive as well as bogus rumors? We will use research in sociology, folklore, and psychology to analyze what kinds of ideas survive the selection process in the marketplace of ideas and to develop a set of strategic tools to craft ideas that are more likely to survive. Topics covered include crafting messages for complex information that don't exceed the capacity of human attention and memory, using emotional appeals that inspire people and motivate action, acquiring attention in a crowded environment, and gaining legitimacy for new ideas, approaches, and technologies.

This course asks the question: What does it take to build a high-performance unit? The focus is on middle and upper-middle management in contemporary complex organizations. These are organizations that have complex tasks, exist in a rapidly changing environment, and have highly skilled subordinates. The premise of the course is that traditional methods of management may produce adequate levels of performance but prevent excellence from developing. New approaches to leadership will be presented that are more likely to lead to a truly high-performing system. Time will be spent discussing the components of effective leadership, what a manager can do to build a high-performing department, and what members can do to support the leader who wants to initiate such changes. The first two classes are required. In addition to class, students will meet for 2 1/2 hours each week in a Skill Development Group to apply the course material to their own personal development. (While there is minimal overlap in content between OB 372 and OB 374 and these two classes are highly complimentary, both require Journals and an evening group. We therefore recommend against taking both classes in the same quarter for workload reasons.)

PRE-QUALIFICATION IS REQUIRED BEFORE GSB REGISTRATION. The focus of this course is to increase one's competencies in building more effective relationships. Learning is primarily through feedback from other group members. This course is very involving and, at times, can be quite emotional. However, this course is not a substitute for therapy; we deal more with inter-personal issues than with intra-personal ones. If you are in therapy, please talk this over with your therapist and get their advice before enrolling in this course. The 36 students of the class are randomly divided into three 12-person T-groups that meet the same evening of the class. It is very important to note that when you decide to take this course, you make an explicit contract to be actively involved. Attendance to the first class is required for this 1-day/week section of this class. Attendance to the first three classes is required for the 2-day/week sections of this class. Failure to attend the first class will result in an automatic drop. Students who are waitlisted must attend either a 1-day/week class (3 hrs) or the first two classes of a 2-day/week section (1hr 45min) to secure a place in the course should space open up. It is the student's responsibility to notify respective OB 374 faculty if your attendance is aimed at fulfilling your waitlist requirement. You also need to inform the faculty member for which specific section you are waitlisted. T-group meetings for all sections commence the second week and will meet for 3 hours the same evening as 1-day/week class and the same evening of the first day of the 2-day/week section. The class goes away for the weekend of the seventh or eighth week (check your specific section) of the course. Because of the highly interactive nature of this course, it is very important that all students attend all sessions. Missing class, class-t-group, evening T-group, or portions of the weekend will negatively influence your grade and may result in a student's grade being dropped one grade level (for each absence). Arriving late on Friday to the weekend will negatively influence your grade level- missing any more of the weekend beyond that will result in a U. Students must pre-qualify before bidding on this course before the deadline for each quarter. Qualification information can be found at https://faculty-gsb.stanford.

Power and influence processes are ubiquitous and important in organizations, so leaders need to be able both to understand power and to act on that knowledge. This course has three objectives: 1) increasing students' ability to diagnose and analyze power and politics in organizational situations; 2) increase students' skills in exercising power effectively; and 3) helping students come to terms with the inherent dilemmas and choices, and their own ambivalence, involved in developing and exercising influence. Topics covered include: the sources of power, including individual attributes and structural position; dealing with resistance and conflict; obtaining allies and supporters; maintaining power; how and why power is lost; living in the limelight--the price of having power; preparing oneself to obtain power; and the use of language and symbolism in exercising power.nnnThe class involves a reasonably large number of written, self-reflective assignments as well as a group project (doing a power diagnosis on an external subject) and an individual project (using the class material during the quarter to gain power in some group or organization or develop a plan for doing so). The emphasis is on both learning the material and incorporating it into one's own actions and plans.

Conflict is unavoidable in every organization. The key question is how it will be handled: will it escalate to dysfunctional levels or will it be effectively managed? Hence, a first aim of the course is to develop your ability to analyze conflicts, to look beneath the surface rhetoric of a conflict, to isolate the important underlying interests, and to determine what sort of agreement (if any) is feasible. We'll analyze which negotiation strategies are effective in different conflicts. We'll also examine psychological and structural factors that create conflict and often pose a barrier to its resolution. nnnBut understanding how to analyze a conflict is not enough. To manage conflict effectively, you need a broad repertoire of behavioral skills. Developing these is the second aim of the course.nnnTo achieve this, negotiation exercises are used in every session. When playing a role in a simulated conflict, you will be free to try out tactics that might feel uncomfortable in a real one. You will get feedback from your classmates about how you come across. You will have an opportunity to reflect on your experience in your negotiation log. In sum, you can use this course to expand your repertoire of skills, to hone your skills, and to become more adept in choosing when to apply each skill.

This course is a Bass Seminar. This course will examine the lives of individuals who contributed greatly to society, either through their contributions to business, politics, the art and entertainment worlds, or society in general. We will take a close look, for example, at individuals such as Steve Jobs, Condi Rice, George Lucas, John F. Kennedy, and Martin Luther King (to name just a few examples). We will develop together a framework for thinking about the "paths to prominence" of such individuals. Students working in small groups will also select an individual or individuals they would like to study. Students will also have an opportunity to apply the framework to their own lives. The course will be very discussion oriented and quite lively, employing a variety of learning materials (including written cases, video material, and reflective exercises).

The entertainment industry is one of the largest and most complex industries in the world. It is an industry characterized by tremendous opportunities and great uncertainties. The industry is currently undergoing tremendous change as new technologies transform the way entertainment is produced and disseminated throughout the world. For all of these reasons, this existing dynamic industry creates tremendous challenges for entrepreneurial students bent on leaving an artistic or creative imprint on the world. This course is designed to help prepare students for careers in the film, television, and cable industries, and to explore innovations within them. The course examines key areas of work in these industries. A major portion of the course will involve bringing to the class speakers representing important aspects of the entertainment industry -- both on the business and creative sides. Topics to be examined include the process of project development, production, and marketing; emerging technologies and their impact on the industry; the roles studio executives, directors, television and film producers, writers, actors, agents, and others play in the making and distribution of film and television productions.

Need approval from sponsoring faculty member and GSB Registrar.

This course is offered for 6 units and runs for the Winter and Spring Quarters. It is open to up to 24 MBA2 students who have been selected on the basis of their having passed a screening to assess their potential to coach effectively. They also need to haven taken OB 374 - Interpersonal Dynamics or OB 393 - Leadership in Diverse Organizations in Spring 07 or will take OB 374 in the Fall or Winter. There will be a reading list. That conceptual material will be supplemented during class time with lectures and discussions. Students will have the opportunity to apply those concepts through role-plays and exercises during class time. Each second-year student will be assigned three first-year students. The second-year coaches will meet with their coaches 5 times each quarter in a series of semi-structured coaching activities.nnnFriday April 3 - Class 1nnMonday April 6 - Class 2/ClinicnnMonday April 13 - Class 3nnFriday April 17 - Class 4nnMonday April 20 - Class 5 /ClinicnnMonday April 27 - Class 6nnMonday May 4 - Class 7/ClinicnnMonday May 11 - Class 8nnMonday May 18 - Class 9/Clinic (this is also when final paper would be do)nnWednesday - Class 10 Final Class and Clinic

How improve capacity to exercise leadership and work effectively with others within the context of culturally diverse groups and organizations. Premise is that diversity presents challenges and opportunities that pushestudents to develop leadership skills relevant across a variety of situations. What social and psychological obstacles limit people's ability to work effectively across identity-based differences? What can people do to build the relational and organizational capacity to enable these differences to be a resource for learning and effectiveness within teams and organizations? Focus is on dynamics of race and gender; attention to other dimensions of identity and difference in organizations, including sexual orientation, nationality, class, and religion.

The ability to function effectively within a hierarchy is a crucial determinant of managerial success, yet many people struggle with "authority issues" that make certain hierarchical roles and positions difficult for them. This course draws on the craft of acting and the science of psychology to help students learn to use themselves to develop the characters that can play these roles effectively. nnnThis class is designed specifically for students who have trouble "playing" authoritative roles: those who find it difficult to act with power, status, and authority. It will also be useful for students who find it difficult to share power and authority, which involves accepting and deferring to the power and authority of others. Participants will be asked to read, think deeply about, and share some of their own feelings about power and authority, and the origins of those feelings. They will also be asked to prepare for and present a series of in-class performances that involve playing characters with and without power, in scenes that highlight the interactions and relationships between high and low power characters. These performances will take up much of our time during class. Out-of-class assignments will include reading important works on psychology, and on the theory and practice of acting, as well as writing short essays analyzing their own and others' performances. nnnNOTE: First session for Monday sections (Section numbers 1 and 2) is April 6 and ends June 1. Thursday section (Section number 3) begins April 2 and ends May 21, with no class on May 28. Each section will have 8 sessions.

This course will explore case studies and research about how to create behavior change from a position without much formal authority or power: e.g., a middle manager trying to change a failing unit of a big firm or a social entrepreneur trying to influence the behavior of a community. We'll use principles from social psychology, clinical psychology, and behavioral economics to analyze cases like the following: How a new head of the equities research department at Lehman Brothers changed his group's ranking in the Institutional Investor polls from #15 to #1 over a four year period. How Teach for America teachers take unmotivated kids in neglected schools and manage on standardized tests to gain more than two year's progress in one year of schooling. How a clever application of behavioral economics managed to triple employee savings rates. This is a new course for 08-09 and will meet from 5:15 pm - 8:15 pm on 4/20, 4/22, 4/23, 4/27, 4/30.

In this seminar, we will explore the nature of human happiness. We will examine recent theories and new evidence from psychological research indicating who among us is likely to achieve deep and enduring happiness-and why. We also will review what we know about the determinants of happiness throughout the lifespan. We will discuss how happiness is created and sustained, even in the face of adversity and tragedy. We will describe the "geography" of happiness, examining different cultural conceptions of happiness and variations in the distribution of happiness around the globe. We will also discuss some prevalent misconceptions regarding the antecedents of human happiness-why so many people, in short, stumble in their quest for happiness. We will explore how leaders can use happiness research to create more satisfying work places. To illustrate these ideas, we will examine in detail a number of fascinating individuals, including Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, Oprah Winfrey, venture capitalist Tom Perkins, Steven Spielberg, Martha Stewart, and the Nobel physicist Richard Feynman. Students will also work, either individually or in small self-selected teams, on a case study of an individual or organization they find interesting. There will also be several reflective exercises designed to probe students' self-conceptions regarding their own happiness. This seminar will be very discussion-oriented and our time will be spent engaging in lively, provocative debate of controversial ideas and evidence about happiness.

This course is open to students who have taken OB 374 Interpersonal Dynamics or GSBGEN 374 Interpersonal Influence and Leadership. The objectives of OB 574 is to take what was learned in the introductory Interpersonal Dynamics course further with a specific emphasis on how those approaches are applicable in a work setting. Specifically how issues of fuller self-expression/disclosure, feedback, resolution of interpersonal difficulties and building effective relationships can apply to working with peers and one's manager as well as in a team setting.nnnThe course will meet Thursdays 3:15-5:00 for five sessions starting April 2nd and running until April 30th. The T-groups will meet that evening, 7:00-9:30. In addition, there will be one all-day meeting (instead of a weekend), Saturday, April 4th running from 9:00 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. Attendance in all class sessions, evening meetings, and the Saturday retreat is required. Any absence will result in lowering of the grade.nnnIn addition to a modest amount of reading, students will keep an on-going self-diagnostic log. One-third of the grade will be on the log and the remaining 2/3 on the extent of participation in class, risk-taking in the group, and helping building learning conditions for self and others.

This course is designed to improve students' skills in all phases of a negotiation: understanding prescriptive and descriptive negotiation theory as it applies to dyadic and multiparty negotiations, to buyer-seller transactions and the resolution of disputes, to the development of negotiation strategy and to the management of integrative and distributive aspects of the negotiation process. The course is based on a series of simulated negotiations in a variety of contexts including one-on-one, multi-party, and team negotiations. When playing a role in a simulated conflict, you will be free to try out tactics that might feel uncomfortable in a real one. You will get feedback from your classmates about how you come across. You will have an opportunity to reflect on your experience in your negotiation paper. In sum, you can use this course to expand your repertoire of conflict management and negotiation skills, to hone your skills, and to become more adept in choosing when to apply each skill. nnnThis course represents a shorter, more intense version of OB 381-Conflict Management and Negotiations. Students should not take both courses, as there is considerable overlap in course content. Attendance and participation in the negotiation exercises is mandatory.

This is a course about how firms learn from their experiences and the opportunities created by flawed learning. It will explore common mistakes in learning and barriers to the adoption of effective practices. Understanding learning problems will help future managers avoid common mistakes and build organizations that learn more effectively; learning is particularly important for entrepreneurs who are trying out new ideas and so must adapt correctly to feedback from the environment. But understanding common mistakes is also useful for identifying possible opportunities in markets; opportunities exist when firms make mistakes and when they fail to learn effective practices. The course will introduce concepts and findings from organization theory, psychology, decision theory, and statistics. A variety of exercises, cases, and readings will be used to illustrate barriers to learning and the opportunities they create, including the book "Moneyball" by Michael Lewis which discusses market-level mistakes in professional baseball.

This course provides a survey of design approaches for non-laboratory research within and among organizations. We review research strategies, design, issues of measurement, archival and survey data collection and methods, dynamic models used to study continuous and discrete outcomes, and network data collection and methods, among other topics. Although the course includes aspects of statistical analysis as well as design, it is not a course in statistical analysis.

Seminar. Social psychological theories and research relevant to organizational behavior. Current research topics; theories in micro-organizational behavior. Topics include models of attribution, choice and decision making, intergroup behavior, stereotyping, and social influence. Prerequisites: Ph.D student; graduate-level social psychology course.

This seminar considers the leading sociological approaches to analyzing relations of organizations and environments, with a special emphasis on dynamics. Attention is given to theoretical formulations, research designs, and results of empirical studies. Prerequisite: Enrollment in a PhD program. Also listed as Sociology 362.

This seminar focuses on topics relevant to organizational behavior, drawing on both social psychological and sociological research. We discuss how theories and methods change as levels of analysis change, with most focus at the organizational, "meso" (intermediate between micro and macro) level of analysis. Topics vary from year to year, but may include: organizational learning or routines; power; emotions in organizations; diversity and demography; organizational identity and legitimacy; culture; contagion and diffusion. Papers and discussion focus on theory development processes, and writing journal articles. Prerequisites: Enrollment in a PhD Program. Cannot be audited or taken pass/fail.IN SPRING 2009 THIS SEMINAR WILL FOCUS ON THE SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY OF EVERYDAY MORALITY.

This course examines the interaction between organizations and their environments. It is given every year by a different faculty member. What follows is the description of the course for the academic year 2008-2009.nnnThis seminar examines theoretical and methodological issues in the study of the ecology of organizations. Particular attention is given to the dynamics that characterize the interface between organizational populations and their audiences.

Cognition, attitudes, and behavior in organizations. Social psychological and sociological research at the meso, or intermediate between micro and macro, level of analysis. Topics vary from year to year, but may include: organizational learning and decision making; power and conflict; emotions in organizations; mobility and stratification; gender inequality and discrimination; networks; organizational justice and legitimacy; and cultural perspectives on organizations. Prerequisite: Ph.D student.

This seminar provides an introduction to several important theoretical and formal models in sociology, psychology, and organization theory. The purpose is, in part, to provide an overview of commonly used models. More important, participants will learn to read, criticize, and formulate models for their own research questions. The focus is on model development, deriving implications from models, comparing models, but also on how models can be and have been tested. Topics include models of size distributions, network evolution, contagion, group formation, conceptual structures, decision making, and learning.

This course is offered for students requiring specialized training in an area not covered by existing courses. To register, a student must obtain permission from the faculty member who is willing to supervise the reading.

This course is elected as soon as a student is ready to begin research for the dissertation, usually shortly after admission to candidacy. To register, a student must obtain permission from the faculty member who is willing to supervise the research.

This course is a Bass Seminar. For masters' and doctoral students in Education and GSB. Empirical research on urban school reform efforts, theoretical frameworks on student and adult learning, the sociology of work in schools, and social organization theory. How community context affects instructional coherence. Dynamics between school professionals and with parents. Authentic instruction and its effects. Case studies on reform implementation.

The course provides an overview of different approaches to leading change in the social sector, drawing primarily, but not exclusively, on case examples in education. While there is a substantial need for innovation and visionary leadership in sectors such as education, social entrepreneurs who want to drive change must appreciate the significant barriers and unique opportunities presented by non-market forces in these sectors. The course will equip students with an appreciation for different mechanisms of change and theories of action as well as some of the challenges of initiating and sustaining meaningful change in social sectors such as education. nnnn The course will draw on readings and case studies, and we will benefit from the wisdom of an inspirational group of guest lecturers. While the course will benefit any student concerned with making a positive impact in the world, it is particularly (although not exclusively) appropriate for students in the joint MA/MBA program as well as those who will lead social change through nonprofit consulting or entrepreneurship.

This seminar examines theoretical and methodological issues in the study of the ecology of organizations. Particular attention is given to the dynamics that characterize the interface between organizational populations and their audiences. Prerequisites: Enrollment in a PhD program.

This course covers research and theory on the origins and function of social norms. Topics include the estimation of public opinion, the function of norms as ideals and standards of judgment, and the impact of norms on collective and individual behavior. In addition to acquainting students with the various forms and functions of social norms the course will provide students with experience in identifying and formulating tractable research questions.

The purpose of this course is to develop students' skill at designing, executing, interpreting, and describing micro-organizational and social psychological research. The course will have a practical focus and will focus on questions such as how to identify and formulate a tractable research question, how to decide on an appropriate research design and strategy; how to operationalize independent and dependent variables, and how to build a research paper.

This year-long course takes a hands-on approach to learning about behavioral research. It will cover the entire process of behavioral research from idea and hypothesis generation to study design, analysis, and publication. The topical content will be customized to the specific interests of the enrolled students, but generally will be concerned with questions about behavioral phenomena in organizational contexts.

The fundamental phenomenon of interest in educational research is the growth in knowledge and skills of individual students. Two facts - that children's growth is typically the object of inquiry and that such growth occurs in organizational settings - correspond to two of the most troublesome and persistent methodological problems in the social sciences: the measurement of change and the assessment of multi-level effects (also referred to as the unit of analysis problem). Although these two methodological problems have distinct, long-standing, and non-overlapping literatures, these problems, in fact, share a common cause - the inadequacy of traditional statistical techniques for the modeling of hierarchy.