Unusual Courses is an occasional series from The Conversation US highlighting unconventional approaches to teaching.
Title of Course: “Management as a Calling”
What prompted the idea for the course? Business schools do not do enough to create successful business leaders with a desire to serve society. All too often, we simply drop an ethics or sustainability elective into a curriculum that puts profits over people—and gives short shrift to big issues such as climate change and income inequality. Thus, we should develop a course that helps students examine their own ethics, values and purpose.
What does the course explore? This course helps undergraduate and graduate business majors consider their career as a calling. Ungraded, its core centers on three weekend retreats where students leave their cellphones behind, join others with similar aspirations and examine their unique purpose in life.
Why is this course relevant now? Today, many are coming to business school with a sense of purpose to make a positive change. Unfortunately, business education has not done a good job of accommodating this demand. Curricula focus far too much on the “how” of business and not enough on the “why.”
What’s a critical lesson from the course? We study what a calling is, techniques for examining each student’s individual calling, and tactics for staying on course. The hope is that students will cultivate a sense of passion and vision in their careers and apply the power of business to address society’s challenges.
What materials does the course feature?
n Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl.
n Life on Purpose by Victor J. Strecher.
n Articles by Parker Palmer, Herbert Shepard, David Foster-Wallace, Deb Meyerson and others
What will the course prepare students to do? This course will help students develop a vision of what a calling is, what their calling is and a desire to make its pursuit a lifelong goal.