21 - 30 of 62 results for: OB

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.nnThe class involves a reasonably large number of written, self-reflective assignments as well as two individual projects (doing a power diagnosis on an external organization that is important to the person) and a doing-power project (using the class material during the quarter to gain power in some group or organization). The class emphasis is on both learning the conceptual material and also incorporating it into one's own strategies and behaviors.

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. But 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. To 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. 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 Bass Seminar and Experiential Workshop will examine what it means to live a life of consequence. Using theories and evidence from the latest and best research on happiness and meaning, we will collectively develop a conceptual framework for thinking about how you personally can design a happier and more meaningful life for yourself. In addition to building a solid conceptual foundation on which to think about your life, you will have substantial opportunities to work individually and in small groups on a variety of reflective and experiential exercises designed to stimulate your imagination regarding how to create greater happiness and meaning in your own life. These engaging and enjoyable exercises include personal writing and public speaking exercises, as well as out-of-class experiential exercises. The seminar will be very discussion oriented and student participation quite lively. The goal of this seminar and workshop is to change how you think about yourself and your life! THIS WORKSHOP IS AVAILABLE ONLY TO FIRST- AND SECOND- YEAR MBA STUDENTS. NO EXCEPTIONS WILL BE PERMITTED.

Research on the Millennial Generation (i.e., those born between 1980-2000) shows that millennials, as compared to earlier generations, have quite different values and priorities when it comes to work. For instance, millennials report that they place a high value on autonomy and creativity at work, and prefer to self-manage their personal productivity. They also report that they value being a good parent and having a good marriage over having a high-paying career. Despite this research, our organizations have been slow to respond to a new generation of workers. This has led to high levels of disengagement, and lower levels of productivity in many organizations. This class will explore the gap between how our organizations are designed, and what a new generation of workers desire in terms of work. Students will work in teams to design a new workplace that is reflective of what workers want in terms of their work. The first part of the course will focus on what the issues and problems are in how organizations are designed for an earlier generation of workers, while the second part of the course will be set aside for team-based project work and presentations.

The entertainment industry is one of the largest and most important 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, the dynamic industry creates tremendous challenges for entrepreneurial students interested in leaving an artistic or creative imprint on the world. This course is designed to help prepare students for careers in the media industries, and to explore leadership within them. The industry is truly an intersection of art and commerce, and a major portion of the course will involve bringing to the class leaders who represent key areas of the entertainment industry, both on the business and creative sides. As with any business, the entertainment industry is driven by the vision of its leaders. These leaders make financial and artistic decisions daily, and manage staff and productions with the goal of producing entertainment product meant to be seen as widely as possible, and meant to make a profit. It is hoped that through interaction with these speakers, students taking this course will gain a greater understanding of the industry and what it takes to succeed in it. Further, the students will see the potential of strong leadership and how it works to advance entertainment companies and the films and TV programming they produce. Topics to be examined include the process of project development, production, and marketing; emerging technologies and their impact on the industry; the roles studio and network executives, directors, film and television producers, writers, actors, agents, and others play in the making and distribution of film and television productions.

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.

This course is designed to provide students with a summary of entrepreneurial processes that have successfully created, developed, and sustained breakthrough ventures. By "breakthrough" we mean ventures that have had a lasting and positive impact, touching millions of lives. We consider ventures that are not only software related, but also ones based on technology and business models that impact markets ranging from medical devices to small satellites to home robotics systems to clean water and more. nThe examples are based on the experiences of Norman Winarsky, formerly President of SRI Ventures, and Henry Kressel, Partner Emeritus at Warburg Pincus. They include companies like Siri, Nuance, Intuitive Surgical, Sandisk, and others. nThe course leads us from the source of breakthrough venture ideas, to building a great value proposition and business plan, recruiting a team, finding investors and board members, deciding whether to sell or go IPO, and ends with what it takes to build a company that can sustain itself through continuous innovation. At each step, we follow examples of companies we've helped build, and provide lessons of success as well as failure. We compare and contrast the strategies of these ventures with other popular strategies, such as those proposing "fail fast, develop minimal viable products, and pivot often..." nThe course will be highly interactive, and engage students in discussing their own experiences and future plans. Invited speakers will include venture capitalists and entrepreneurs who have created breakthrough companies.

This course examines organization culture, how and why managers can use culture to maximize results within an organization, and how culture can undermine results. The course begins by situating cultural leadership and management within a culture-shaping framework and the opportunities, obligations and methods for leaders to impact culture. It also focuses on what is different in cultural management and why so many contemporary firms attempt to use it. We analyze the relationship between culture and strategy, seeking alignment between the two. The course also explores different kinds of cultures seen in high performing and low performing organizations, and seeks to understand how cultural content affects behavior and business results. Students will be asked to describe and define the culture of an organization needed for a given business and strategy, and to define the role of executives in shaping culture. The class identifies and analyzes the tools or levers that leaders can use to build an effective culture. We will spend a session on each of the following: culture and strategy alignment, architecture for shaping culture, selecting people for cultural alignment, aligning organizational practices, culture and society, cultural inflection points from start-up to scale, cultural aspects of high performance and cultural diagnostics. The course will end with a session on culture issues in merger and acquisition.

This course is designed to improve your effectiveness a manager by introducing you to both the concepts and tools that are part of the "new science of social networks" as they apply to organizations. In this course, you will develop the skills to understand social networks and recognize social capital, both offline and online, as well as be able to identify key elements of your own and others? social networks that enhance competitive capabilities. Topics to be covered include how social networks affect power and influence, leadership, innovation and the generation of novel ideas, careers, organizational change and competitive advantage. Additional topics to be covered include the increasing importance of online social networks in organizational life and the importance of social cognition and how it can be used to enhance social capital. At the conclusion of this course you will have the skills to map out social networks, diagnose features of the networks that either help or hinder the performance of individuals, groups and companies, and be able to manage important features of social networks in organizations.