OVERVIEW

Foster your analytic and academic skills by deepening your understanding of the unique demands of particular work systems.

Enhance your appreciation of the professional, political, cultural, emotional and ethical nuances of organisational life.

The Master of Leadership and Management (Organisation Dynamics) is designed for work-experienced professionals who wish to develop their managerial capacities through the application of systems psychodynamic concepts to their actual experience of managing. The course supports the development of individual capacities to shape and take up work roles that are meaningful, values-based, and which serve the ultimate purpose of the organisation. It provides industry relevant, post-graduate education grounded in rigorous conceptual development and work experience and provides opportunities for engagement with real world learning in a social and global context.

COURSE DESCRIPTION

The Master of Leadership and Management (Organisation Dynamics) integrates work experience with academic theory.

Students can expect a course that:

• uses international industry benchmarking to enhance course development, delivery and relevance
• provides opportunities for engagement with real world learning in a social and global context
• facilitates connections across disciplines and contexts through an integration of psychological, sociological, anthropological and philosophical approaches to organisations.

COURSE STRUCTURE

The Master of Leadership and Management (Organisation Dynamics) is offered on a part time basis to people with an appropriate level of work responsibility and experience.

The course is designed around cohorts of students learning together across time.  It is a ‘temporary’ organisation within which students study the emerging classroom dynamics alongside the issues that concern them within their own organisations.  Small student cohorts (twenty or less) enter Year 1 and remain together as a learning group, as far a possible, across the three year course. Assessment reflects the focus on work-integrated learning.  The assignments are practical in application whilst also requiring use of rigorous theoretical concepts. The course is a carefully designed learning experience that is tailored to support incremental learning that builds semester by semester across the course. To qualify for the award of postgraduate degree of Master of Leadership and Management (Organisation Dynamics) students must complete 10 units (144 credit points).

COURSE CONTENT

Psychodynamic theories are studied as a basis for understanding, withstanding and creatively managing unconscious defences which impede work group functioning and task accomplishment.

Students in this course will:

• learn how to use ‘role’ as a unit of analysis in exploring organisational dynamics and behaviour,
• analyse the conjunction of technology and human behaviour (socio-technics) as a principal feature of organisation design and the social architecture of work relations,
• take a ‘systems’ perspective on the management of connections, sometimes hidden or unconscious, between people, tasks, structure, technologies and context
• develop the capacity to think with, and to lead, others purposefully in the face of change and uncertainty.
• use action research methods for collaborative discovery and problem solving in work settings, and
• sharpen writing skills for clarification of thinking and communication, dissemination and publication of thoughts, working hypotheses, reasoned analyses and research findings to relevant stakeholders.

UNITS OF STUDY

The course is offered in part-time mode only across six semesters. Subjects are taught in modular blocks of day/week long, followed by online classes across the semester.

Students must complete 10 core units of study (144 Credit points).

YEAR 1

Semester 1

MLM1 Organisations and Management through the Art of Metaphor (12 credit points).

MLM2 Unconscious Processes in Groups and Systems (12 credit points).

Semester 2

MLM3 ‘Through a Cultural Lens’: Collaboation with the ‘Other ‘ at Work (12 credit points).

MLM4 Systems Psychodynamic Consulting (12 credit points).

YEAR 2

Semester 1

MLM5 Strategy in Complex Systems (12 credit points).

MLM6 Organisational Role Analysis (12 credit points).

Semester 2

MLM7 Managing Beyond Organisational Boundaries: Networks and other Relations (12 credit points).

MLM8 Leadership and Authority for Role and Task (12 credit points).

YEAR 3

Semester 1

MLM9 Action Research (24 credit points).

Semester 2

MLM9 Action Research continued (12 credit points).

MLM10 Publishing and Disseminating Action Research (12 credit points).

ADMISSION REQUIREMENTS

Completion of a three year Bachelor degree or equivalent AND at least five years relevant work experience.

Special entry may be granted to no more than 10% of the intake, in any given year, to those who have not completed a three year Bachelor degree or equivalent, but who have other tertiary qualifications and extensive relevant work experience.

Students entering this degree are required to have a minimum level of english language proficiency (details of these requirements can be found at www.nioda.org.au/policies).

5FEES AND COSTS

Fees are payable by the due date before each semester begins.  In 2020 the fee will be $11,500 per year ($2,875 per subject).

Payment can be made upfront by direct deposit, credit card or by utilising FEE-HELP.  Information for FEE-HELP can be found on the study assist website https://www.studyassist.gov.au/help-loans/fee-help.

There are no incidental fees charged for this course.

Fees are reviewed each year with the new schedule published each October for the following year.

Many employers have study support policies that include financial and other support.  Speak to your employer to find out if you are eligible to receive such assistance during your postgraduate studies.  Employers gain significantly from the studies undertaken.

Application for ‘Leave of Absence’ must occur prior to the first class in that semester.  Fees will not be refunded after the census date in either semester.

HOW TO APPLY

Post-graduate application.

Application for the course involves completion of a written form and a face face interview. All successful applicants will be made a formal offer of place after which they can proceed to enrol.