Ethical Leadership
Why study business ethics? The Ethics Resource Center reported in the 2005 National Business Ethics Survey that 52% of employees observed at least one type of misconduct in the prior
year. Just over half of those employees reported the misconduct to management. A July 2007 report from the Institute of Business Ethics entitled "Does Business Ethics Pay - Revisited"
concludes that doing business ethically pays. In a five year study, there was a significantly greater positive relationship between providing business ethics training and financial performance, compared to companies which only had a code of ethics without implementing ethics training throughout the company.

This seminar will first examine several companies which experienced major legal and ethical lapses, such as Enron, Adelphia, and Tyco, which led up to the passage of Sarbanes-Oxley. The seminar will then pose ethical scenarios which business leaders have faced for discussion.

Entrepreneurship-the start up
Statistics show that the lion’s share of the new jobs and wealth are being created by business start-ups.  Since 1980 the Fortune 500 has lost 5 million jobs while small businesses (500 people or less) have created 34 million jobs1.  Some of the largest and most profitable companies today started recently with a great idea and great talent (Microsoft, Google, eBay, etc.). Many people have great ideas for starting a business but don’t really know how to go forward. Some people working for large companies have had a brilliant idea turned down the firm they work for. We will discuss the key success factors to be evaluated when considering a new venture start.

Objective: The objective of this session will be to read a simple case about a new business idea. Using class discussion we will collectively determine what factors are crucial to the success of the start up and how they should be addressed. We will suggest how the business documented by the case can be made stronger. This material will help us to define the essentials of a business plan that can be used as the basis for a new business start and for an investment pitch to potential sources of funding.

1 Timmons, Jeffery and Spinelli, Stephen New Venture Creation Entrepreneurship for the 21st Century, McGraw Hill seventh edition, 2007, p. 51

Emotional Intelligence: The Other Kind of Smart
IQ and technical functional competence are absolutely necessary to succeed in today's competitive global marketplace.  Intelligence is like table stakes in a poker game - you can't get in the game without it.  However, those table stakes won't help you win the game - they are necessary but not sufficient.  In order to be a player you have to keep managing the game and upping the ante.  Emotional intelligence, the "other kind of smart", is the differentiating factor between being a good player and being a great player.   Emotional intelligence is quite simply the ability to understand self and others and the ability to manage self and others; all critical skills for effectively leading others and organizations in this challenging global environment. 
 
In this interactive seminar you will be introduced to the concept of EI and learn how to apply EI concepts to yourself and your workplace.

Entrepreneurial thinking in medium to large firms
Medium and large companies are interested in becoming more innovative and faster to market to succeed in today’s era of hyper-competition.  Commodity products are moving offshore and today’s differentiators are often new products, services, and ways of doing business. All of this points to being more entrepreneurial in the medium and large firm. It is documented that most of the innovation comes from outside the established industry (e. g. personal computer, digital photography, semiconductors). How can companies use a more entrepreneurial model to their advantage?