Content

This unit will help students to apply key concepts of organisational behaviour, psychodynamics, systems thinking and spirituality to the task of leadership. The student will be helped to take up the role of leader in his or her current working situation and develop the capacity to lead adaptive change in the workplace.

Unit code: DS8041J

Unit status: Archived (New unit)

Points: 24.0

Unit level: Postgraduate Foundational

Unit discipline: Spirituality

Delivery Mode: Face to Face

Proposing College: Jesuit College of Spirituality

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Learning outcomes

1.

Identify their organisation as a living human system and describe how people behave on the basis of their internalised organisational pictures

2.

Demonstrate an understanding of the concept of role and the experience of being a person in a leadership role in an organisational system

3.

Appropriate and demonstrate the skills of adaptive leadership

4.

Reflect and integrate an understanding of what it means to be contemplatives in action in the workplace

5.

Articulate the meaning of faith, values and belief in one’s own work and life and that of the workplace.

Unit sequence

Prohibited combinations: Old codes: DS8120J / DS8129J

Pedagogy

Two weekend intensives eight weeks apart, with eight 1.5-hour weekly group sessions of role consultation in-between using Skype.

A significant proportion of each weekend of the intensive will be devoted to: (i) the lecturer’s input on the theoretical understanding of leadership, (ii) guided reading, (iii) personal reflection, (iv) facilitated interaction in small groups.

Indicative Bibliography

  • Armstrong, David. Organisation-in-the-mind: Psychoanalysis, Group Relations and Organizational Consultancy. London, UK: Karnac Books, 2005.
  • Barton, Ruth Haley. Strengthening the Soul of your Leadership: Seeking God in the Crucible of Ministry. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2008.
  • Benefiel, Margaret. Soul at Work: Spiritual Leadership in Organizations. New York, NY: Seabury Books, 2005.
  • Denning, Stephen. The Secret Language of Leadership: How Leaders Inspire Action through Narrative. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2007.
  • Heifetz, Ronald, & Marty Linsky. The Practice of Adaptive Leadership: Tools and Tactics for Changing Your Organization and the World. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Business Press, 2009.
  • Greenleaf, Robert. Servant Leadership: A Journey into the Nature of Legitimate Power and Greatness. Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 2002.
  • Long, Susan. The Perverse Organisation and its Seven Deadly Sins. London: Karnac Books, 2008.
  • Lowney, Christopher. Heroic Leadership: Best Practices from a 450-Year-Old Company That Changed the World. Chicago, IL: Loyola Press, 2005.
  • Pitcher, Patricia. The Drama of Leadership (Kindle Edition). Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley and Sons, Inc. 2008.
  • Pitcher, Patricia. Artists, Craftsmen and Technocrats: The Dreams, Realities and Illusions of Leadership. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley and Sons, Inc. 1997.

Assessment

Type Description Word count Weight (%)
Essay

5000-word integrative essay

5000 80.0
Forum

Engagement with and contribution to sharing groups equivalent to 1000 words

1000 20.0
Approvals

Unit approved for the University of Divinity by John Capper on 19 Oct, 2018

Unit record last updated: 2022-10-04 11:18:38 +1100