There are a lot of managers in the business world, but it takes something more to become a workplace leader.
The Eccles School can provide that missing piece with its professional development for Utah executives. The Executive Education office is inviting people in management positions to participate in the Executive Leadership Series, a five-day certificate program held once a month for five months that provides managers the skills and abilities they need to truly engage in a leadership role.
“We’ve been hearing things like: ‘We’ve had higher sales revenue since we attended this program,’ ‘Employee morale has been so much better since we sent this manager to this program,’ ‘This manager has become someone who is not managing but is really leading,’” said Jared Stephens, manager of the Eccles School’s Executive Education program. “That feedback is so exciting to hear.”
The five classes, which focus on topics ranging from negotiations to strategic thought to turning around a struggling business, are spread out over as many months, allowing busy executives to fit the classes into their schedules more easily.
The classes take place on the following days:
- Feb. 27
- March 26
- April 23
- May 14
- June 18
Visit UtahExecEd.com for more information, or email ExecEd@utah.edu or call (801) 335-4952.
Listen to the audio podcast below for more details.
Podcast Transcript
Eccles School: Welcome to the Eccles Extra Podcast, I’m your host Sheena McFarland. Today we’re joined by Jared Stephens who is manager of the Executive Education Program. His role at the David Eccles School of Business is to work with the University of Utah faculty to develop certificate and customized classes for companies and organizations. These classes are designed to make an immediate impact for these companies. He specifically worked to help develop the Executive Leadership’s Series to meet the needs of business leaders in Utah. Jared, thank you for joining us today. First why don’t we start with a basic question: what exactly is the Executive Education?
Jared Stephens: The Executive Education Program in the School of Business is the corporate and professional development side of the Business School. We work with organizations around the state of Utah and the United States to bring them on campus and develop customized classes for their organizations dealing with any sort of business topic that our executive MBA and professional MBA professors teach, whether it’s business leadership, negotiations, strategy or business turnarounds. We’ll deliver it for the company for a specific group of people. We also do certificate programs that are specifically targeted toward specific groups and organizations that help them develop the business acumen and become better leaders for their companies and organizations.
Eccles School: Great, so what is the Executive Leadership Series?
Jared Stephens: So the Executive Leadership Series is a certificate program that we developed specifically for senior managers in organizations. It’s a five-day program, spread out between February and June that covers topics that we feel like every leader in organizations should have exposure to help them become those better managers, better leaders to better tackle the problems that they’ll encounter. If they’re leading an entire organization, if they’re leading a department or if they’re just leading a small team of people, we feel this certificate program can be impactful for them.
Eccles School: Who from the University of Utah and the Eccles School of Business will lead the series’ courses?
Jared Stephens: So we’ve handpicked faculty that teach in our Executive MBA Program as well as our professional MBA program that we feel like have the best backgrounds to make an impact for this group. There are faculty members who are considered top researchers in their field who will teach in this as well as faculty members who were CEOs themselves for many, many years before coming to the Business School to teach. So we feel like we’ve really hand-selected some great faculty that are used to teaching executives in that EMBA program and that have been teaching companies for many, many years in executive education that have the backgrounds to make an impact.
Eccles School: That’s great. For people who participate in this program, what questions of theirs will the series answer?
Jared Stephens: We really want them to understand – and in one of the modules for example that is all about leadership – what is the difference between a manager and a leader. How can you better prepare yourself to not only manage the day-to-day activities of the company but lead the people that are a part of this fabulous organization you probably work for? How can you inspire and motivate them? How do you leverage human resources to be a sustainable competitive advantage?
We cover different things dealing with negotiation and conflict resolution, how can you identify if your company may be beginning to struggle and how do you turn around a company that’s struggling. And then also, what are some strategic or sustainable competitive advantages that your organization can take advantage of in your specific industry, which would be the strategy module. It really covers those topics that we feel are most relevant to these business leaders that can really help them go back to their companies and make an impact the following day when they leave class.
Eccles School: Why should an owner of a business or a leader of a business send some of their managers to the Executive Leadership Series?
Jared Stephens: And that happens quite often by the way. We work with these organizations that identify high potentials that will be stepping into these vital roles in the near future to become a VP, become a director. And the feedback we’re getting from the companies that have sent people to this program the last year is: This wasn’t a program where they came back the following day and their manager or CEO ask them, well how was it? And the answer is “good” and that’s the end of it; nothing ever changes. And it happens so often in training and sometimes classroom settings, but we feel like this has been a program where we’re beginning to get the feedback from companies that say this individual came back and has implemented several ideas, not only to improve themselves but to improve their department; to help their employees become motivated. They’ve helped turn around this team of people that were struggling with motivation and completing their job tasks.
The other great thing about this program is you have the opportunity over the course of several months to network with great business leaders in the valley that come to this, whether it’s an HR manager for Zions Bank or VP with CHG Healthcare or someone from Rio Tinto, you’ll have the opportunity to talk with these other business leaders about what problems they’re facing in their own organizations and take that information and really turn it around themselves and find out if that is something that I can implement in my own job, in my own position for the better.
So we’re hearing things like we’ve had higher sales revenue since we attended this program, employee morale has been so much better since we sent managers to this program, this manager has really turned into someone that’s just not managing but is leading their organization to be successful. And that feedback has been so wonderful to hear and so valuable that we’re excited to be offering this now for the third time in a row and continue to see an impact from these companies.
Eccles School: Excellent. Business leaders are so busy, so how do these classes fit in with that busy schedule?
Jared Stephens: So we definitely considered the busy schedule of an executive when we developed this, so instead of having to come five days in a row – which not only is that difficult to do but you’re downloading so much information that it’s hard to really make sense of what’s going on in a format like that. So we spread out these five class days, these five modules to happen between February and June. So you’re basically here once every three or four weeks – once a month – and that allows them really to get the information and to work through the group work and cases for that one topic and then to leave with some sort of assignment to go back to their company to talk about what they’ve learned and how it can make a difference for them and for their organization. They’ll have a month to work on that and then come back that following month and to be able to discuss it. So it’s really a great format that allows them to practice what they learned and they come back and talk about it with the other executives the following month instead of just getting five straight days of a lot of topics. So it’s been a great format for us, something that’s easy for an executive to – or easier for an executive to make – it also creates a better learning opportunity I think.
Eccles School: What’s the best way for someone who is interested in the Executive Leadership Series to find out more information?
Jared Stephens: Well they’re very welcome to give us a call, and we can be reached at 801-335-4952 and talk to myself or a member of my team or they’re welcome to visit www.utahexeced.com , execed is E.X.E.C.E.D.com or email us at execed@utah.edu.
Eccles School: Excellent. Well thank you so much for joining us and for sharing such great information.
Jared Stephens: Yeah, thank you so much. I appreciate it.
Eccles School: This has been Sheena McFarland with the Eccles Extra Podcast.