New MBA Leadership Course
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| Paine: “We want students to realize their full potential as business leaders.” Courtesy HBS Communications |
When Andy Mulkerin (HBS ’05), a chemical engineer by training, came to HBS he knew that his class would be the first to take Leadership and Corporate Accountability (LCA), a new required course. Like others in his class, Mulkerin met the news of the first-year offering — which had received widespread media coverage — with a groan. “I thought it would be eighty minutes of preaching,” says Mulkerin, who was pleasantly surprised when LCA turned out to be the class he looked forward to most. “The discussions forced us to think about complicated issues,” he adds, noting that there was never a right or wrong answer. “It gave us a systematic approach to thinking about difficult situations.”
That’s exactly what the thirteen-member faculty design team had in mind when they created LCA, says design-team member and course head Lynn S. Paine, one of ten HBS faculty members who taught LCA this year. Paine explains that after a lengthy review of the first-year offerings on managers’ responsibilities that began in 2001, the faculty voted to develop a new course focused on leadership, values, and corporate accountability. In early 2003, Dean Kim B. Clark appointed the interdisciplinary group of senior faculty members to the design team. Meeting weekly to hash out their ideas, the group worked together closely to create a framework for the new course.
The team divided the curriculum into three interrelated parts. First, students learn about the legal, ethical, and economic responsibilities of companies and their leaders. Next, they look at organizational systems and governance structures that can foster responsible behavior. Finally, they examine their personal values and how they can live by those values in their professional lives.
“We want students to realize their full potential as business leaders. Our goal is to help them understand — in very practical terms — the responsibilities that people take on when they become managers,” explains Paine.
For Moscow native Nina Pogossova (HBS ’05), LCA provided a richer understanding of complex issues and an international perspective. “In class, I could see where people were coming from and how their point of view is derived from their environment and their assumptions. I frequently had to explain my often controversial point of view, which was derived from my own environment,” says Pogossova, adding that class discussions helped everyone form an international framework.
“The students find the material very engaging and provocative,” says Paine, and Mulkerin notes that “the conversations frequently continued well after class.” Paine and the other LCA faculty members will teach the course again next year. She describes creating the course as like planning a long trip. “You spend a lot of time thinking about your itinerary and imagining different destinations along the way,” she observes. “But once you get on the road, you are constantly adjusting as you go.”
