Master of Science in Organizational Leadership

This course provides a foundation for understanding the significance of communication strategies and skills and their application to developing capabilities for leadership in today’s complex and multi-faceted organizations. Students are exposed to many different styles of communication used by effective leaders, including contemporary collaborative models. The theoretical frames for communication and leadership provide students with perspectives that assist them in developing their own personal model for effective communication in their leadership roles.

This course studies strategy formulation and implementation in international and domestic business enterprise. Case analysis and other appropriate methodologies are used to develop the skills and judgment necessary to provide overall direction to the organization. In particular, the course emphasizes the translation of strategy formulation to strategy implementation.

This course focuses on how organizational change can be managed. In order to survive in rapidly changing and highly competitive operating environments, organizations must learn how to continually adapt, evolve, contract, expand, and innovate. Organizational change management is about implementation of business strategies, and more generally, new ideas and practices.

This course considers the key aspects of what it means to be a leader in our ever-changing global business environment. Best practices and key considerations for developing global strategy, driving change around the world, managing multicultural teams, addressing the intricacies of a global supply chain, and the challenges we face from macro trends, such as climate change and sustainability.

This course examines the staffing function of management including planning, recruiting, selection, training, motivation, appraisal, compensation, labor laws, and organizational development. The course also addresses the current issues affecting the human resource manager including the changing work force and need to increase productivity as well as changes in the areas of unions and affirmative action.

This course covers basic statistical techniques in a managerial setting featuring case studies and conceptual exercises. Statistical topics include effective use of numerical and graphical summaries, estimation and confidence intervals, hypothesis testing and regression. A few more advanced topics such as data mining, the Bayesian paradigm and principles of model building may be encountered during projects.

This is a communication skills course designed to better understand the nature of conflict and its resolution through persuasion, collaboration, and negotiation. Students learn theories of interpersonal and organizational conflict and its resolution as applied to personal, corporate, historical, and political contexts. Students assess their own styles, skills, and values, and develop techniques to better resolve disputes, achieve objectives, and exert influence.

This introduces the discipline of ethical analysis and its application to management. The course examines different methods of value clarifications, the sources of ethical conflict in management practices, the structure of ethical argu­ments, as well as the ethical theories and principles associated with management. The course also explores how these concepts are concretely applied in organizations and professional life.

This course is an introduction to the significant theoretical frameworks that have emerged over time to describe and explain organizations. There is no single theory of organization but rather a body of theory relating to organizational development. Examining this body of theory will enable the student to 1) better understand human activity in an organizational environment from a theoretical perspective, and 2) use the knowledge as a guide for future managerial applications.

This course focuses on the essentials of project management. It approaches project management from the standpoint of managing a single, stand-alone project that is small to medium in size. The course takes attendees through the project life cycle in the same sequence they would face when managing a real project in the workplace. Topics covered include the product and project life cycles, including initiation, planning, executing, controlling, and closing.

The internship is a hands-on working experience in the student’s field of concentration requiring a minimum of 150 hours of placement under the supervision of both an employer and a faculty member. Beginning in the semester preceding the internship placement, the student identifies what type of organization they desire for their internship. The student holds primary responsibility for obtaining a field experience site and is responsible for setting up interviews with prospective internship sites Students may not perform internships at their current place of employment without prior consent of the Dean of Graduate and Professional Studies. This course is taken during the student’s final graduate semester

In this course, students undertake comprehensive research projects under the direction of a faculty mentor. The project is an intensive study based on action research models from the behavioral sciences enabling the student to demonstrate the mastery of the concepts, ideas, knowledge, and insights implicit in the Master of Science in Management curriculum. No later than the semester preceding the undertaking of the Research Project, the student should present to the designated faculty mentor a two-page summary of the proposed research. Each student makes a public and professional presentation of their Capstone Project findings. This course is taken during the student's final graduate semester.