Course Curriculum
Learn how to become a more effective leader
You will learn how to be a more effective, authentic, and inspiring democratic leader. You will learn how to relate to power, build trust, clarify your purpose, use storytelling for leadership, expand your influence, lead an effective team, read the room (group dynamics), and face your fears to grow as a person and as a leader.
Module 1: What is Democratic Leadership
Explore the foundational principles of democratic leadership and what it means to lead in today’s world. Learn More
Module 2: How to adapt in the face of uncertainty? (Adaptive Leadership)
Learn to navigate and lead through complex, changing environments. Learn more
Module 3: How to create Democratic Space? (Teams & Group Dynamics)
Master the skills needed to build effective, collaborative teams. Learn more
Module 4: How to empower and develop new leaders? (Coaching)
Discover how to inspire and grow leadership in others. Learn more
Module 5: What are you prepared to sacrifice to exercise leadership?
Engage in a leadership simulation that tests your ethics and decision-making. Learn more
Module 6: Who are you becoming? (Identity)
Reflect on your identity as a leader and how it shapes your leadership style. Learn more
Module 7: Storytelling as Leadership Practice - What is your story?
Learn to articulate your leadership purpose through the power of storytelling. Learn more
Module 8: How to overcome the resistance to change? (Immunity to Change)
Uncover the barriers to change and how to overcome them, both personally and within organizations.
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Module 9: How to build trust & influence for more effective leadership?
Develop strategies for building trust and expanding your influence as a leader. Learn more
Module 10: How to have a productive conflict and difficult conversations?
Learn the art of navigating and resolving conflicts constructively. Learn more
Module 11: Becoming a Systems Thinker (Systems Thinking)
Understand the broader impact of your leadership decisions within complex systems. Learn more
Module 12: How does personal, collective and systemic power work?
Explore the dynamics of power and how to use it responsibly. Learn more
Module 13: How does social change work? - Social Movements (Community Organizing)
Analyze how large-scale change happens and how to lead within movements.
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Module 14: How to continuously work on your leadership development?
Develop a lifelong plan for your leadership growth and apply all you've learned. Learn more
Class Pedagogy
This course is highly interactive and experience-based. You won’t just learn about leadership—you’ll practice it. Each session is a workshop where you’ll engage in discussions, simulations, and exercises. You'll work on real-world leadership challenges, individually and in teams. The course is focused on practicality and immediate application of learned.
Action Learning
Each class is a workshop. We will do exercises that will create a very dynamic learning experience.
Interactive Classes
You are teacher too! Student participation is the key, so you will get many chances to speak and act.
Simulations
We will use real-life events and teamwork to recreate real-life dilemmas and pressures. Sometimes we will use imagined scenarios too.
Practical Assignments
The goal is to export learnings outside the classroom into the real world. Students will have opportunities to test out new leadership tools right away! This is a pic of a student-led event about misinformation.
Real Discussions
Real discussions where we will disagree, explore alternatives, and go deep. In this picture is a class with guest speaker JiangLi Yang - Chinese dissident and pro-democracy activist.
Work in Teams
You will be assigned to a student team of 4-5 people. Your task will be to explore your leadership challenges and work on collective project.
Democratic Leadership Framework
Democratic Leadership is about creating opportunities for everyone to reach their full potential. This is achieved by fostering a structure & culture that enables power to be shared, diverse voices to be heard, ideas to be explored, and differences to be expressed.
To become a Democratic Leader, you must develop capacity in all 4 areas from the model described in this picture. The secret is in synergy between these 4 areas! We will address each of them throughout the class. leadership skills.
To become a Democratic Leader, you must develop capacity in all 4 areas from the model described in this picture. The secret is in synergy between these 4 areas! We will address each of them throughout the class. leadership skills.
