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2015/2016  KAN-CCDCO2006U  Leading and Managing Intercultural Projects

English Title
Leading and Managing Intercultural Projects

Course information

Language English
Course ECTS 7.5 ECTS
Type Mandatory
Level Full Degree Master
Duration One Quarter
Start time of the course First Quarter
Timetable Course schedule will be posted at calendar.cbs.dk
Study board
Study Board for BSc og MSc in Business, Language and Culture, MSc
Course coordinator
  • Charles Tackney - Department of Intercultural Communication and Management (ICM)
Main academic disciplines
  • Intercultural studies
  • Project and change management
  • Statistics and quantitative methods
Last updated on 11-08-2015
Learning objectives
To achieve the grade 12, students should meet the following learning objectives with no or only minor mistakes or errors:
  • Define the concept of a “project” and the essentials involved in the leadership practice of “project management” from the different perspectives developed in the literature over time, and explain the differences between those perspectives.
  • Specify the roles, task, and interests of project participants and stakeholders, and be able to assess aspects of team dynamics, power relations, and organizational strategy in relation to the task of leading and managing projects.
  • Define and compare the concepts of project risk, uncertainty, and complexity, and present the key conventional and alternative approaches to managing these factors in leadership and management of projects.
  • Evidence knowledge of financial and statistical literacy essentials in respect to Project management.
  • Analyze and explain how intercultural project leadership and management functions within the larger context of complex organizations, with particular attention given to the variance characterized by national or regional employment ecology models and how this variance can influence project leadership and management outcomes.
Course prerequisites
Bachelor degree. Knowledge of corporate strategy, management theory, and organizational behavior is an advantage, but not a precondition for participation. The course is offered as required component in of the first year Diversity and Change Management (DCM) concentration in Intercultural Management. It is open to students in other CBS graduate programs, including international students participating in exchange programs.
Examination
Leading and Managing Intercultural Projects:
Exam ECTS 7,5
Examination form Home assignment - written product
Individual or group exam Individual
Size of written product Max. 15 pages
Assignment type Project
Duration Written product to be submitted on specified date and time.
Grading scale 7-step scale
Examiner(s) One internal examiner
Exam period Autumn
Make-up exam/re-exam
Same examination form as the ordinary exam
Course content and structure

This course will take up the leadership tools necessary to design, manage, and evaluate project work by exploring the conceptual foundations for successful project management in today’s globalized, complex organizations and societies. We go beyond simple, and simplistic, “how-to” or best practice approaches to the subject of project management in several respects. First, case analysis will offer detailed study and class discussion on leadership and management of projects. Second, the epistemology of project leadership will be steadily developed from case analysis and research literature on project management. Third, a historical sense of the project leadership and management literature will offer essential context for Master’s specialization in Diversity and Change management through study of the comparative employment ecologies of modern organizations in respect to their national origins and encounters in project sites.

 

Participants will consider how to manage uncertainty and risk associated with project work. We will explore how the human elements of power, politics, and interrelationships play into the success and/or failure of projects. The course will help student grounding in project leadership and management epistemology as a course end in itself, but also as a preparation for study of concepts and practices introduced in other areas of the later DCM curriculum. Such curriculum related themes include culture, complex organizations, strategy, stakeholders, diversity, and geo-political regional differences.
 

Analysis of several project cases that evidence both successful and unsuccessful project management will provide students with practical examples of the themes and principles under discussion. In particular cases, the management of projects in transnational and intercultural contexts will refine student sensibility about the genre of case-based studies: what is provided for reflection – and what is left out. This course aims to help students become reflective and reflexive project managers and leaders, as reflective consumers of project management literature: able to read such material with a proper sense of case literature strengths as well as weaknesses.

Teaching methods
The approach includes assigned readings and lectures with inductive case reading, reflection, and guided class discussion. Case discussions will employ the Harvard Business School style “case method.” Some cases lend themselves to small-group discussion in advance of a plenary summation, other benefit from an instructor-guided discussion.

The learning model presumes regular class attendance for appropriate understanding of the course materials and success regarding the learning objectives. Class discussion will depend upon and presume student preparation of cases prior to each class.
Last updated on 11-08-2015