Online 
The job of a school leader has never been more complex. Today’s principals are charged with a wide array of responsibilities – from generating better student outcomes, to recruiting, managing, and retaining high-quality faculty and staff, to cultivating collaboration and collective learning.
Offered as a course within the Certificate in School Management and Leadership (CSML), an innovative collaboration between the Harvard Graduate School of Education (HGSE) and Harvard Business School (HBS), Leading People provides school leaders with the skills needed to manage and motivate staff, foster continuous improvement, and build leadership capabilities among individuals, groups, and teams throughout the school.
Course Objectives
Leading People participants will:
- Implement specific strategies to cultivate a skilled and motivated staff, ensure staff members are aligned with the school’s vision and objectives, and build shared ownership around these goals.
- Learn how to distribute leadership among staff and across the school community to increase productivity, collaboration, and empowerment.
- Establish a supportive school culture where systems and structures enable all adults to become engaged learners and gain expertise through collective learning and continuous improvement.
- Understand the school leader’s role in communicating institutional goals to community stakeholders and identify strategies that can help foster greater buy-in for these goals.
Participant Experience
Hosted on the innovative HBS Online platform, Leading People is an entirely virtual, highly interactive, and case-based course. Leading People participants:
- Engage in case-based learning with HGSE and HBS faculty on topics that include education, business, and policy
- Watch virtual case studies featuring leaders from a representative cross-section of U.S. schools and businesses, and analyze the leaders’ experiences, insights, and best practices
- Engage in interactive activities to learn and network with a diverse group of participants who hold school leadership positions worldwide
- Reflect on their practice, knowledge, skills, and understandings—and identify opportunities to apply course learnings to their unique context
- Gain first hand experience with the case-based and inductive learning model
For a look at the participant experience, view the demo video below.
The course also features engaging case studies of the following practitioners:
- Dr. Todd Boucher, Principal, Popps Ferry Elementary School in Biloxi, MS
- Ryan Huppert, Principal, City High-Middle School in Grand Rapids, MI
- Dr. Joey Jones, Principal, Robert Frost Middle School in Rockville, MD
- Dr. Araceli Montoya, Principal, Wildflower Accelerated Academy in Goodyear, AZ
- Dr. William Healy, Orthopedic Surgeon and Former Chairman of Orthopedics at Beth Israel Lahey Health in Burlington, MA
- Dr. Michael Thompson, Senior Orthopedic Surgeon at Beth Israel Lahey Health in Burlington, MA
