Learning to Lead - Virtual

Personal benefits

This program will help new leaders learn the ropes of leading and managing employees:

• Develop a deep understanding of the challenges that emerging leaders encounter
• Broaden your repertoire of communication skills and learn to motivate and inspire employees
• Help employees find meaning in their daily work
• Find meaning in your role as an emerging leader
• Learn how to use motivation tools for the recruitment, selection, development, and retention of employees
• Become an effective manager of employee performance by leveraging human capital management
• Create long-term commitment between your followers and yourself
• Learn how to continue to develop yourself as a leader over time

Organizational benefits

Organizations will benefit from new leaders who inspire followers and who are more effective in their day-to-day roles as managers. They will:

• Experience less friction during transition periods in which team leadership changes
• Develop leaders of tomorrow in their first steps towards becoming a leader in your organization
• Create strategic alignment between the goals of employees, leaders, and the entire organization
• Enhance creativity and innovation in the organization
• Reduce turnover amongst emerging leaders and in their respective teams
• Become an employer of choice by ensuring a successful transition of employees into emerging leaders

Program content

The program covers two modules:

Module 1: Leading With Meaning

This module will focus on the leadership of teams. Participants will learn how to create meaning for themselves and their followers:

• Understand the psychological needs of your followers
• Motivate followers by promoting psychological experiences of autonomy, relatedness, and competence
• Promote creativity and innovation through intrinsically motivated followers
• Cultivate positive emotions in yourself and your followers
• Inspire followers with a growth mindset
• Change the conversation from ‘what’ to ‘why’
• Develop a broader understanding of how your team contributes to the organization and society at large
• Develop yourself as an emotionally intelligent leader

Module 2: Managing Your Talent

This module builds upon the leadership fundamentals from the previous module by showing participants how to put these elements into action through the management of their human capital. They will:

• Understand how to choose new talent to prioritize alignment with your organizational goals and needs
• Develop the skills for effectively recruiting and hiring new employees
• Learn to identify and manage conflict as well as employees who are behaving in dysfunctional ways
• Develop the knowledge and skills necessary to manage employees’ performance with ongoing coaching, performance assessments, and performance improvement discussions
• Identify and manage your team’s performance through goal-setting and alignment with the larger organization

Dynamic Virtual Classroom

Participate in the program from anywhere. Our online learning platform combines live, interactive video instruction with breakout sessions, panel discussions, and expert Q&A.

Our learning platform is fully encrypted, allowing you to connect securely from home, office or anywhere in between.

Virtual programs are designed to fit within your schedule, allowing you to learn new skills and immediately put them to work.

Session Leaders

Session leaders include senior professors from Smith School of Business and knowledgeable experts from industry. These outstanding teachers are constantly in touch with today's business world through real-world business experience, Board memberships and their own consulting practices.

Jana Raver

Organizational Behaviour
Smith School of Business

Dr. Jana L. Raver is the Associate Dean of Faculty and E. Marie Shantz Professor of Organizational Behaviour at Smith School of Business, Queen’s University, and is also cross-appointed to the Department of Psychology. She is an authority on interpersonal and team dynamics at work, with a specific emphasis upon helping organizations and employees to overcome adversity and enhance collaboration. Her research has investigated many difficulties that employees face (e.g., conflict, cultural differences, mistreatment, stressors, adapting to remote work) and ways that they can overcome adversity (e.g., building high-performance teams, bolstering resilience, voicing concerns, promoting learning, enhancing positivity). Her research is international in its scope, addresses social problems, and carries implications across levels and disciplines (individuals, teams, organizations, societies). Her research has been recognized with several best paper awards, it is regularly published in top-tier management journals, and it has been disseminated widely through media outlets. She chaired the Conflict Management Division of the Academy of Management, has served on the editorial boards of several top-tier journals (Academy of Management Journal, Academy of Management Review, Journal of Applied Psychology), and has been Associate Editor for two journals (Organizational Psychology Review, Applied Psychology: An International Review) in addition to several other leadership roles. She has also consulted and conducted applied research in both the public and private sectors. She has taught many courses in organizational behavior, leadership, and team processes that span academic programs at Smith School of Business. She holds a Ph.D. in Industrial and Organizational Psychology from the University of Maryland.

Matthias Spitzmuller

Organizational Behaviour
Smith School of Business

Matthias Spitzmuller is an Associate Professor and Distinguished Professor of Organizational Behaviour at Smith School of Business.

His research focuses on team motivation/team leadership, and on helping behaviours/cooperative work behaviours and has been published in leading academic journals.

Matthias has served as a lecturer on leadership in executive education programs at the National University of Singapore, China Europe International Business School (CEIBS) in Shanghai, Harvard Business School Publishing, and Smith School of Business. He recently spent one year at the China Europe International Business School (CEIBS) in Shanghai where he taught in CEIBS’ MBA and EMBA programs. Matthias completed his Ph.D. in Organizational Behaviour under the guidance of Prof. John R. Hollenbeck at Michigan State University. He also holds an MBA from the University of St. Gallen in Switzerland. Before embarking on his academic career, Matthias worked in Human Capital Management Consulting.