Foundations of Leadership

Overview

The course "Foundations of Leadership" explores foundational leadership principles to help you develop the skills and traits necessary for senior technical leadership roles. Through engaging modules, you’ll analyze leadership approaches, including traits and skills-based theories, ethical practices, and modern leadership styles like transformational, servant, and adaptive leadership. You’ll gain critical thinking skills using Paul and Elder’s model, assess your leadership strengths, and learn to navigate ethical dilemmas effectively. What sets this course apart is its focus on practical, self-reflective learning. By bridging theory and practice, you’ll evaluate your leadership characteristics, compare them with peer feedback, and apply leadership theories to real-world challenges. You’ll also explore diverse leadership models, from Path-Goal Theory to Authentic Leadership, tailored to enhance your ability to lead in complex, dynamic environments. By the end, you’ll have a comprehensive understanding of leadership theories, styles, and critical thinking techniques to drive team performance and foster organizational growth.

Syllabus

Course Introduction

This course provides a comprehensive exploration of essential leadership theories and styles, focusing on senior leader traits, critical thinking, and various approaches to leadership, including ethical, behavioral, and transformational. You will develop a solid foundation in both traditional and contemporary leadership models to effectively guide and inspire teams.

Senior Leader Characteristics & Critical Thinking

This module focuses on developing key senior leader traits and critical thinking skills essential for effective leadership. You will learn to apply the Paul and Elder’s critical thinking model, assess your leadership characteristics, and analyze the experiences of senior technical leaders to enhance your leadership approach.

Trait & Skills Approach to Leadership

This module explores how to define and perceive leadership, helping you analyze the gap between your self-assessment and feedback from five peers on your leadership traits. Additionally, you will examine measures of technical, human, and conceptual leadership skills to refine your leadership effectiveness.

Behavioral & Situational Approaches to Leadership & Ethical Leadership

This module examines preferred ethical styles for addressing ethical dilemmas and evaluates task versus relationship orientations in leadership. You will also explore how the SLII Model informs your understanding and interpretation of your leadership style at the mid-term point.

Path-Goal Theory, Leader-Member Exchange Theory & Transformational Leadership

This module delves into the directive, supportive, participative, and achievement-oriented leadership behaviors, assessing their impact on team dynamics. Additionally, you'll analyze the quality of leader-member relationships from a leadership perspective and explore your preferences for transformational versus transactional leadership styles.

Authentic, Servant, & Adaptive Leadership

This module explores various dimensions of authentic leadership, evaluates servant leadership behaviors, and assesses the strengths and weaknesses of adaptive leadership. You will gain insights into how these leadership styles can be effectively applied in different organizational contexts.