Mission

The mission of CU Boulder’s Leeds School of Business is to educate principled, innovative leaders who drive value for businesses. We are introducing the Business Leadership Certificate as a way to enhance our existing programming around leadership.

Certificate Description

The Business Leadership Certificate provides students with the foundations of theory and research on leadership, but emphasizes personal growth and professional experiences such as coaching, mentoring, and engaging in leadership roles. By the time they graduate, students should be poised to start embracing leadership challenges as they unfold, make sense of leadership experiences, feel comfortable with business leadership and societal leadership dynamics, and lead with an ethical compass.

The Business Leadership Certificate is recommended for students who:

  • are interested in learning about the art and science of leadership
  • have the desire and motivation to engage with personal growth and to discover their own potential
  • understand and accept that the leadership is based on personal development as much as professional development
  • want to accelerate their leadership development so they can best learn from their early career experiences
  • want to start their own companies or lead important projects for social change

Benefits

Business leadership certificate students get:

  • Access to the most updated and multidisciplinary findings from science
  • The chance to practice leadership concepts and tools for work and life
  • Guidance in their own personal growth process

Requirements

To teach students to be leaders, we must go beyond the traditional classroom, providing students with the opportunity to engage in leadership experiences and to make sense of those experiences to prepare them for future leader roles. As such we include both classroom and experiential requirements to the certificate.

Coursework (12 credits)

Mods BCOR 2202 and 2302 (3) Organizational Behavior and Ethics
ORGN 3030 (3) Critical Leadership Skills
BAIM/ORGN 4210 (3) Systems Thinking

One additional Leeds leadership or ethics/diversity class:

ORGN 3025 (3) Essential Management Skills
ORGN 4300 (3) Leading Diverse, Inclusive Organizations
CESR/ORGN 3040 (3) Fundamentals of Ethical Leadership
CESR 4000 (3) Leadership Challenges

Experiential

Experiential Learning: 

  • Students must complete a Leadership Experience (organized and led every year by the director in collaboration with other possible professionals) such as a weekend retreat or some practical workshops. These experiences are meant to take the learning beyond the classroom.
  • Students must complete an Impact Team Project to show understanding and applications of modern leadership dynamics. This project is part of the course “Systems Thinking”, one of the mandatory courses for the certificate. By passing such course, students automatically fulfill the project requirement.

Apply for Admission

Please complete Your application here and email the assistant director at Olivia.Wheeler@colorado.edu if you have any question. The director of the program is Antonio Papuzza and can be reached at antonio.papuzza@colorado.edu