A total of 30 credits are required to complete the MS in Organizational Leadership & Change degree.
Course requirements can be finished in one to two years. Students may begin the program at the start of either the Fall or Spring semesters. The majority of the coursework for the program will be delivered in an online format.
Organizational Change
This course investigates the nature of change, forces for change, and the impact of change on its recipients. Introduces students to the practice of organization development with respect to change efforts in organizations as they examine their own roles and skill sets as change agents. Stresses the design and implementation of various organizational interventions. Students learn to choose between, and then design, appropriate interventions to transform an organization from a current state to a desired future state.
Employee Learning & Development
This course emphasizes the principles of adult learning and provides an understanding of adult development from a broad liberal arts perspective. Students learn and apply the techniques and procedures used in the development of adult learners, including employment settings in different organizations and at all organizational levels.
Organizational Leadership
This course provides students with an overview of a variety of theories, methods, and models of leadership, with an emphasis on the cultural context in which leadership is pursued. Students will explore their own model of leadership by reflecting on the models presented in class, through interactions with peers/colleagues within the course, and by constructing a leadership profile.
Individual and Team Interventions
This course examines individual and team interventions from a psychological perspective. Topics covered include individual performance improvement, performance coaching, teams and teamwork, conflict resolution, and process consulting.
Organizational Theory and Design
This course examines the techniques used to study and analyze organizations as holistic entities comprised of interdependent component parts. The course explores the manner in which organizational analyses are positioned, designed, implemented, and evaluated. Various data gathering methods are explored relative to critical organizational variables such as strategy/mission, goals/objectives, measurement, communication, group boundaries, power and status, relationships, rewards, operations/processes, structure, design, employee learning and growth, and customer satisfaction. Utilizing the data from an organizational analysis to guide and target subsequent planning, leadership development, and team development initiatives is emphasized.
Consultation in Organizations
This course examines various client-consultant issues arising from psychological interventions. Topics covered include entry and contracting, diagnosis and role setting, implementation, evaluation, withdrawal and maintenance. Consistent with the College's Sinsinawa Dominican values, special attention is given to ethical issues and standards relative to the concept of "organization as client".
Strategic Leadership
This course is designed to teach action research as both a process and a methodology. Emphasis is placed on the development of skills that can be transferred to any organization as an internal or external consultant. This course will focus on the creation, implementation, assessment and evaluation of an organization in a specific area. Concepts of tests and measurements will be emphasized for interpreting research results and gathering data for applied research. Students will develop a project based upon their research and apply the concepts learned within their own setting under the guidance of the professor.
Leading in a Global Context
The purpose of this course is to introduce concepts and theories related to globalization and culture. As organizations prepare for conducting business in the 21st century, their people need the ability to traverse organizational and country boundaries. Cross-cultural interactions are anticipated and the challenges inherent in working in countries other than one’s own are identified.
Business Ethics
This interdisciplinary course explores and implements the critical thinking and managerial and ethical decision-making skills necessary for developing ethical organizations and an ethical society. The objective of this course is to design ethical organizations and create organizations of high integrity. Students explore real-life ethical dilemmas and benchmark their organization’s performance with the best practices in business ethics.
Organizational Development and Behavior
Organizational Development and Behavior is the study of both the human behavior in an organizational setting and the operations related to organizational design and development. The purpose of this kind of study is to equip organizational leaders with the insight necessary to develop interpersonal relationships that will build teams, increase productivity, enhance the quality of work life, orchestrate change, improve employee retention, and augment communication. Topics in management including: Perception, Personality and Attitudes, Group Process: Building Teams, Communication, Orchestrating Change, Motivation, Empowerment, Leadership, Organizational Development, Quality Assurance, Performance Appraisals and Business Ethics.