Stepping Up: Leading Others (Coursera)

This course is aimed at leaders and managers who have five to six years experience and who are beginning to manage teams, customers and clients more regularly or more directly. Learners will likely have a technical or professional early career but as they are progressing in their careers, they are having to start grappling with the issues of team and organisational leadership.

By the end of this course, you will be able to:

– Explain the differences between a team and work group, and why this is important for a leader.

– Describe strategies for leading peers, dealing with blockers and disruptors.

– Set effective objectives, know best practice for delegation and techniques to drive performance in your teams.

– Hold important, challenging conversations which leaders need to have, and implement the key elements of coaching and mentoring as a leader.

Course 3 of 4 in the Leadership Out of the Box Specialization.

Syllabus

WEEK 1

Team Dynamics

This week we are going to begin by considering what we mean by the term “team” and explore how this might different from other working groups. We shall see how depending on the nature of the group you are learning, how you lead will need to change. We shall discuss the stages of team development, looking at how teams change through time, and consider remote and hybrid teams, along with the challenges and opportunities they present.

WEEK 2

Leading Your Peers

This week we shall be focussing on building team culture, trust and leading teams of peers. We are going to start by exploring team culture and the importance of difference before considering some of the main challenges of developing and leading teams. We shall also look at how you can build and retain the trust of your team and identify some strategies to help you lead your peers.

WEEK 3

The Leader as Guide

This week you are going to explore the value of setting clear objectives, and learn what good objectives look like. We shall look at how to set effective objectives before looking at the role of feedback, and how to give feedback successfully. We are going to consider the importance of letting go as leaders, avoiding micromanaging, and how you might do this well, and we shall end the week with a consideration of coaching. You will see a popular coaching model and look at how coaching can be done well.

WEEK 4

Important Conversations

This week we are going to look at the important conversations you need to have as a leader. We shall explore the risks associated with too much agreement within teams, as we look at the phenomenon of “groupthink”, and ways to combat it. We are also going to consider how you can promote more challenge within your team, and give you ideas on how to have those challenging conversations. We will see ways to strategically introduce conflict and think about the role of mentoring within this context.