96101 - Organization, Teams and Digital Leadership

Learning outcomes

At the end of this course students know the basics of organizations' design, how to build, manage and motivate work teams, both physically available and online. Students can make use of conceptual and computational models to manage and understand distributed intelligence.

Course contents

Information, communication and identity. Groups, teams and coordination modes. Organizational routines, difficulty and possibilities for organizational change. The Garbage Can decision model. Organizations ecologies and their dynamics.

Readings/Bibliography

Teaching material is available on VirtuaLE. Class discussions may suggest topics for the exam, that are not included in the teaching material.

Teaching methods

Front lesson. Attendance is recorded.

Assessment methods

The exam has two components:

1. A written exam contributing a maximum of 20/30 to the final grade. The written exam consists of 5 questions to be answered within a given maximum number of words. Each question comes with a specific maximum threshold in the 20-200 words range. Any text exceeding this threshold will be discarded. Each question controbutes 4 grades. Questions concern both the theories and the examples illustrated in class. The written exam must be done within 1 hr time. Smartphones, earphones and smartwatches are not allowed. Students equipped with such devices will be invited to leave them at adequate distance.
   
2. An essay on a case-study related to the course, to be delivered by e-mail close to the exam. This essay contributes a maximum of 10/30 to the final grade but honors are granted to exceptionally good works. Essays are still valid upon rejection or grade refusal, but are not evaluated unless at least 10 has been obtained in the written exam. Any length between 5,000 and 15,000 characters is acceptable, spaces included, references excluded, figures, tables and captions excluded. Essays must be written in scientific style, straight to the point with a very short introduction. Appropriate references must be provided for any claim that is not being made by the author. Insofar it concerns the style of references please visit this site -> Teaching -> Dissertations -> Appearance. In special cases, the essay can be substituted by a piece of computer code. This possibility must be agreed with the lecturer.
   

Essays are case-studies linking theory to practice. Please avoid writing theory in your essay unless it is a different theory from those expounded in class. Theory should be kept at a minimum in any case, essays must deal with practice.

The stories appearing in these essays can be drawn from one's own personal experiences, or experiences of friends or relatives, or they may have been inspired by a book or a film. Adding fictional details to real stories is allowed. Contructing a purely fictional story is also allowed but, unless one has outstanding writing abilities, purely fictional stories risk not too entail sufficiently many details. Details are crucial.

Practical experiences are the backbone of these essays, but they must be related to this course. Students are invited to ask themselves the following question: "If I had not attended this course, would I have written my essay in exactly the same way?" The answer must be a clear "No." In order not to make this mistake, students are invited not to write their essays when the course is still in its beginnings.

Final grades (1) + (2) are awarded with the following criteria:

• 18-22 for sufficient preparation and sufficient analytical capabilities expressed in a correct language.
• 23-26 for a technically adequate preparation and articulate analytical capabilities expressed with the appropriate terminology.
• 27-29 for a deep knowledge of the topics illustrated in this course, substantial capabilities of expressing critical assessments, mastery of specific terminology.
• 30-30+honors for a particularly deep knowledge of the topics illustrated in this course, substantial capabilities of expressing critical assessments and drawing connections between issues and topics even in other courses or disciplines, mastery of specific terminology.
  

The grade obtained on Organization, Teams and Digital Leadership (6 CFU) is averaged with the grade obtained on Fundamentals of Management (6 CFU) to obtain one single comprehensive grade labeled Fundamentals of Management and Organization. This comprehensive grade cannot be recorded unless both component exams have been passed. Both component exams must be passed within the current academic year. If only one component exam is passed, its grade is lost.

Students are allowed to refuse the grade that they obtained. Please communicate this decision by e-mail within one week after publication of grades (holidays included). Late communications may be accepted upon discretion. Earlier deadlines may be occasionally stated in the section "Notice" of this web site. Students who successfully passed an exam and did not refuse their grading are not allowed to attend subsequent calls of the same exam.

Teaching tools

Blackboard, beamer, computer simulations, class discussions.

Office hours

See the website of Guido Fioretti