Haas offers a comprehensive leadership development program with workshops and Berkeley Innovative Leader Development.
1) Berkeley Innovative Leader Development (BILD)
Leadership development is incorporate throughout the MBA program through BILD. The initiative starts with orientation sessions that give students the understanding of processes and models for defining problems and creating innovative solutions.
Core Courses
During the core course, students are required to attend the leadership development course - Problem Finding, Problem Solving. The course teaches students to learn different approaches for solving complex problems where the information associated with each problem is uncertain and complex.
The Problem Finding, Problem Solving course acts as the Foundation for the experiential courses that follows. It introduces students to the vocabulary and framework for innovation, with lessons on critical thinking, design thinking and creative problem solving.
In addition to learning the fundamentals with the core courses, students will also learn to effectively communicate and motivate individuals with courses like Leading People and Leadership Communications.
Experiential Learning Required Course
BILD requires students to complete at least one of the experiential learning courses: Advertising Strategy, Cleantech to Market, Corporate Social Responsibility, Design and Development of Web-Based Products and Services, Design and Marketing New Products, Haas Socially Responsible Investment Fund, The Haas Investment Fund, Haas@Work, International Business Development, Lean Launchpad, Managing New Product Development, Real Estate Investment Analysis and Social Sector Solutions.
These courses teach practical aspects of leadership development by covering areas ranging from Strategy to Real Estate Investment. The projects under experiential learning involve real projects with real companies. The results of the projects are presented to all stakeholders in the organization.
Electives
The Haas MBA Curriculum offers students with the option to apply leadership skills in a wide range of focus areas including technology, entrepreneurship and finance. Some of the interesting courses are Negotiations & Conflict Resolution, Storytelling for Leadership, and Innovation in Services and Business Models. If the students have found some of the Experiential courses interesting, they can also take these courses as part of the elective.
2) Leadership Development Series
In addition to BLD, Haas School of Business also conducts workshops that cover three aspects of leadership: self, team and organization.
Self
The workshops that are part of leadership development on a personal level include:
a) Stand Out: Build Your Brand
This workshop teaches you how to utilize your core personality for building an interesting personal brand for achieving your goals, professionally.
b) Leading Through Uncertainty
Change management is a key skill in Business. With an ever-changing technology landscape, this workshop teaches students to address uncertainty and embrace the ambiguity associated with Business environment.
c) What Got You Here Won’t Get You There
This workshop teaches you to develop a new perspective and practices to transform your behaviour, and prepare yourself for success.
d) Managerial Decision Making
People don’t make decisions logically. This workshop teaches students about the limitation of intuition and offers tools to improve decision making skills.
e) Leadership Presence
An interesting workshop on how techniques used in theatre arts can be adopted in building skills and developing behaviour for leadership.
f) Artful Bragging
Another interesting workshop on how to sell yourselves artfully.
Team
The leadership skills at a personal level are different from what is required at a team level. Leadership Workshops designed for team provide the framework for managing and building a high performance team.
a) Building High-Performing Teams - What Great Leaders Know and Do
This workshop focuses on building team with diverse skills, backgrounds and abilities. The tools provided in the workshop give practical tips for overcoming team dissatisfaction.
b) Leading High Performance Teams
This workshop introduces students to two important concepts: fixed mind-set and growth mind-set, and how to cultivate growth mindet in a team.
c) Coaching for Optimal Performance:
Coaching is an integral part of managing a team. Learn the difference between Coaching for development and Coaching for performance with this interactive workshop.
Organization
Leadership at the organization level has the maximum impact. Therefore, it is essential to understand leadership from this context.
a) Leading Change
Most personalities can be classified under 2-3 leadership styles. In a constantly changing Business environment, relying on core leadership style can be detrimental in handling the complex scenarios in an organization. This workshop teaches students to evaluate their strengths and weaknesses, and identify actions that can accentuate their leadership effectiveness.
b) Power & Influence
An interesting workshop on politics within an organization, and how communication and incentives, enable efficient distribution of resources.
c) Building A Healthy Organization
The workshop introduces a concept called ‘organizational health’, and students will get specific advice on making the team more functional.
d) Organizational Savvy
A workshop on using organizational politics at the right dose, manage influence and negative perceptions.
Some of the Previous Speakers in the workshop include William Arruda (Branding expert, Entrepreneur & Author), Marshall Goldsmith (best-selling author and leadership coach), Peggy Klaus (author of BRAG! The Art of Tooting Your Own Horn Without Blowing It and The Hard Truth About Soft Skills: Workplace Lessons Smart People Wish They’d Learned Sooner), Patrick Lencioni (Founder and president of The Table Group, and the author of eight best-selling books), Steve W. Martin (author, sales trainer, and keynote speaker), Pamela Puryear (Founder, Claritas Consulting Group), Mary Ann Rettig-Zucchi(Founding member of the Jupiter Consulting Group) and Roberta Streimer (Founder of Organizational Diplomacy, a Bay Area consulting service that offers mediation, leadership development, seminars and coaching to businesses)
Recommended Reads
a) BILD
b) Leadership Development Series
Question 1: What makes you feel alive when you are doing it, and why? (300 words maximum) (Video Essay)
Question 2: What are your short-term and long-term career goals, and how will an MBA from Haas help you achieve those goals? Short-term career goals should be achievable within 3-5 years post-MBA, whereas long-term goals may span a decade or more and encompass broader professional aspirations. (300 words max)
Question 3: Distance Traveled: At Berkeley Haas, we consider "distance traveled" as the contextual information that helps us understand the unique circumstances, challenges, or influences that have shaped your personal and professional journey.
We invite you to share aspects of your background, personal circumstances, or significant experiences that have meaningfully impacted who you are today and how you've reached this point. Please tell us how these experiences have influenced your perspectives, decisions, and aspirations, and how they contribute to the person you are becoming. (300 words max)
About the Author
I am Atul Jose, Founding Consultant of F1GMAT, an MBA admissions consultancy that has worked with applicants since 2009.
For the past 15 years I have edited the application files of admits to the M7 programs: Harvard Business School, Stanford Graduate School of Business, the Wharton School, MIT Sloan, Chicago Booth, Kellogg School of Management, and Columbia Business School, together with admits to Berkeley Haas, Yale School of Management, NYU Stern, Michigan Ross, Duke Fuqua, Darden, Tuck, IMD, London Business School, INSEAD, SDA Bocconi, IESE Business School, HEC Paris, McCombs, and Tepper, plus other programs inside the global top 30.
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