The program is a combination of overnight retreats and individual sessions over a six-month period led by Columbia University. It is designed around three leadership domains: leading self, leading others, and leading organizations. Peer learning is core to the program, as is a blend of lectures, small group activities, and simulations. Through this program, you will learn the framework and gain the tools needed to meet the challenges you face today and in the future.
Upon completion of the program, participants will receive a certificate from the Columbia Business School Tamer Institute.
Session topics may include:
Values-Based Leadership
Leading with authenticity and a strong set of values is a timeless and worthwhile pursuit. Participants produce their own “values hierarchies” and learn how to use them as an individual tool. At the end of the session, discussion focuses on how individual values hierarchies can produce greater organizational performance and employee commitment.
Leading Change
Ensuring that the structure of nonprofit organizations is consistent with its strategy almost always requires substantial organizational change. This session provides a roadmap for implementing change in ways that permit organizations to realize their strategic goals without inflicting undue human and financial costs.
Leading Inclusively
Research shows that employees who work in more inclusive climates report higher levels of commitment, satisfaction, perceived organizational support, willingness to engage in citizenship behaviors, and a lesser likelihood of leaving the organization. We will discuss how to implement these types of employee practices and the importance of how this work is undertaken so that longer-term changes to the organizational climate can occur.
Negotiations
Whether one likes it or not, managers of nonprofit organizations (more than the managers of firms) are required to negotiate to get things done. Moreover, research on nonprofit management clearly establishes that inadequate negotiating skills are one of the major drawbacks to effective leadership. Participants will learn frameworks and concepts for analyzing different kinds of negotiating situations and for determining the costs and benefits of varied negotiating strategies and tactics.
Leading Organizational Culture
In this session we’ll identify how an effective organizational culture affects performance through increased commitment and contribution and improved collaboration. We’ll discuss how leading culture is different from leading other parts of the organization and identify best practices for leading culture. We’ll finish by practicing a process that can be used to identify values for a team, department, or organization.
Mediation and Navigating Difficult Conversations
Navigating difficult conversations can be challenging. Yet having real dialogue and meaningful exchange is necessary for interpersonal learning, growth, and positive change. In this session, we’ll learn and practice strategies for approaching difficult conversations with courage and curiosity, particularly when communicating across cultures and identity groups.
Equity and the Myth of Merit
This session examines one of the core paradoxes of meritocratic beliefs that can lead to inequality. It provides leaders with a set of tools to design against these beliefs and this paradox with a framework called “Going to the M-A-T” (Merit, Accountability, and Transparency).
Strategic Communication
There is a secret to successful communication, something that separates the good presenters from the great ones, the decent negotiators from the pros, and the average writers from those who get results. That secret is a three-pronged approach to communication that can be summed up in one word: AIM. This session focuses on (A) analyzing an audience, (I) identifying an intent, and (M) making messages memorable.
Self-Management and Leadership
To lead others, people must first be able to manage themselves. This session draws on recent advances in self-management to help executives become more effective.
Making Strategic Choices
In this session, participants will discuss the challenge of making strategic choices and then be introduced to a strategic choice-making process. Participants will walk through the steps of the process using a case/example organization’s strategic issue.
