GRA 8256 Leading and Organizing Digitally (2020/2021)

GRA 8256 Leading and Organizing Digitally (2020/2021)

Course code: 
GRA 8256
Department: 
Strategy and Entrepreneurship
Credits: 
5
Course coordinator: 
Vegard Kolbjørnsrud
Course name in Norwegian: 
Leading and Organizing Digitally (2020/2021)
Product category: 
Executive
Portfolio: 
EMBA Digital - Programme courses
Semester: 
2020 Spring
Active status: 
Active
Level of study: 
Master
Teaching language: 
English
Course type: 
One semester
Introduction

Participants will learn about the demands and opportunities facing leaders and organizational designers in a digital work environment. Leadership will be presented as a cognitive process, outlining how digital technologies have and will blend into the traditional ways that leadership has been conceived. These developments will have consequences for internal processes such as the ways we organize, and the way leaders understand their roles. Participants will learn about how the traditional role of leadership needs to adapt to the changing nature of work in the digital age, agile ways of organizing, how leadership relates to learning and innovation, and how digital technologies, as a value-creating resource, may affect leadership.

Learning outcomes - Knowledge

The candidates will acquire knowledge about leadership in digitally enabled organizations. They will learn about the changing nature of work and how that affects leadership and organizations, as well as the benefits and issues arising from the use of intelligent technologies in leadership and organizational processes such as decision-making. Candidates will also acquire knowledge about organizational learning, digital mindsets as well as agile and collaborative organizational forms.

Learning outcomes - Skills
  • The candidates will be able to apply knowledge about human cognition to leadership and organizational processes.
  • The candidates will be able to plan and organize organizations that make use of the dual-natured knowledge concerning humans and machines.
  • The candidate will be able to identify the different digital mindsets represented in their organization or team and know how to both influence and leverage the digital mindsets of others
  • The candidate will be able to evaluate the organizational context, and take steps to create the environment needed to support the learning and innovation that drive digital transformation The candidates will be able to design and lead agile and collaborative organizations
General Competence
  • The candidates will be able to critically assess risks and opportunities in projects that require extreme balancing of exploration and exploitation.
  • The candidates will be able to see their own strengths and limitations as a key to designing and running teams that make good use of technology.
  • The candidate will be able to reflect on their own digital mindset beliefs and the implications their fundamental beliefs about new technology have on others around them
  • The candidate will develop a broader competence for enabling organizational change and renewal as it relates to new technology and digital transformation
  • The candidates will be able to critically assess the appropriateness of different organizational forms for different purposes and conditions.
Course content
  1. Leadership in digitally enabled organizations
  2. Digital and the changing nature of work: Intelligent automation and digital augmentation of human problem solving and decision-making.
  3. Digital mindsets: Influencing and leveraging individual beliefs about personal and situational resources in the context of technological change.
  4. Enabling transformation: Leadership that creates a learning organization and the adaptive space for innovation to occur
  5. Organizing digitally: Organizing agile and collaborative collectives of human as well as digital actors
  6. Digitization as a project: Keys to leadership and organization in digital initiatives.
Teaching and learning activities

The course is created around six whole days, one for each point above. On these days, the students will meet a mixture of practical cases, lectures and group discussions as well as company visits and guest speakers. Throughout the week, the students will work in groups to sum up their learning at the final day, presenting real cases that illustrate or criticize the concepts offered throughout the course week. Finally, the students are required to write their own leadership development plan for advancing their digital leadership skills.

1 ECTS credit corresponds to a workload of 26-30 hours.

The course is conducted through a total of 54 hours of lectures and 96 hours of self-study.

Attendance to all sessions in the course is compulsory. If you have to miss part(s) of the course you must ask in advance for leave of absence. More than 25% absence in a course will require retaking the entire course. It's the student's own responsibility to obtain any information provided in class that is not included on the course homepage/ It's learning or other course materials.

This is a course with continuous assessment (several exam components) and one final exam code. Each exam component will be graded using points on a scale 0 -100. The components will be weighted together according to the information in the course description in order to calculate the final letter grade for the course.

Students who fail to participate in one/some/all exam components will get a lower grade or may fail the course. Candidates may be called in for an oral hearing as a verification/control of written assignments.

Candidates may be called in for an oral hearing as a verification/control of written assignments.

Specific information regarding the points system and the mapping scale beyond the information given in the course description will be provided in class. This information may be relevant for requirements for term papers or other hand-ins, and/or where class participation can be one of several elements of the overall evaluation.

The course is a part of a full Executive MBA programme and examination in all courses must be passed in order to obtain a certificate.

Software tools
No specified computer-based tools are required.
Exam categoryWeightInvigilationDurationGroupingComment exam
Exam category:
Submission
Form of assessment:
Written submission
Exam code:
GRA 82561
Grading scale:
Point scale
Grading rules:
Internal examiner with external supervisor
Resit:
All components must, as a main rule, be retaken during next scheduled course
70No4 Week(s)Individual Individual leadership development plan, counts 70% of the final grade.
Exam category:
Activity
Form of assessment:
Presentation
Exam code:
GRA 82561
Grading scale:
Point scale
Grading rules:
Internal examiner with external supervisor
Resit:
All components must, as a main rule, be retaken during next scheduled course
30No -Group (2 - 8)Group presentation, counts 30% of the final grade
Exams:
Exam category:Submission
Form of assessment:Written submission
Weight:70
Invigilation:No
Grouping (size):Individual
Duration:4 Week(s)
Comment:Individual leadership development plan, counts 70% of the final grade.
Exam code:GRA 82561
Grading scale:Point scale
Resit:All components must, as a main rule, be retaken during next scheduled course
Exam category:Activity
Form of assessment:Presentation
Weight:30
Invigilation:No
Grouping (size):Group (2-8)
Duration: -
Comment:Group presentation, counts 30% of the final grade
Exam code:GRA 82561
Grading scale:Point scale
Resit:All components must, as a main rule, be retaken during next scheduled course
Type of Assessment: 
Continuous assessment
Grading scale: 
ECTS
Total weight: 
100
Student workload
ActivityDurationComment
Teaching
40 Hour(s)
Prepare for teaching
35 Hour(s)
Student's own work with learning resources
75
Self study, feedback activities/counselling and exam
Sum workload: 
150

A course of 1 ECTS credit corresponds to a workload of 26-30 hours. Therefore a course of 5 ECTS credit corresponds to a workload of at least 135 hours.