Course Descriptions - MA in HR

HRM 500 Human Resources and the Employee Experience

A culture of high employee development and meaningful work is the most productive environment for both businesses and employees. Unfortunately, most employees are not actively engaged at work. This course will focus on the strategic role and workplace experience of human resources in the life of the organization--from recruiting to exit interviews. We will explore both internal and external factors impacting the employee experience and how understanding their needs, motivation, and challenges will transform the workplace. Looking through the lenses of HR strategy and employee experience, we will address topics throughout the entire journey an employee takes in an organization, as well as an overall perspective on common good leadership, ethics, DEI, and resilience.

HMR 510 Strategic Talent Management

This course focuses on creating organizational excellence by planning, identifying, recruiting, engaging and retaining talent. Participants will examine the role of HR leaders in consulting and advising organizational leaders on talent management priorities, risks, and solutions. Topics include strategic workforce planning, staffing models, employment testing, engagement and retention strategies, succession management, outsourcing, and integration of technology. Participants will explore global, cultural and ethical considerations in managing an increasingly diverse and remote workforce. 

HRM 520 Compesation and Benefits: Total Rewards

Compensating employees as part of a total rewards strategy that aligns with organizational strategy is critical and complex. This course engages various approaches to using compensation effectively to reward performance, create engagement, and measure the impact of a company's compensation strategy. This course covers relevant HR law guiding compensation and benefits and encourages creative thought in meeting employee needs related to total rewards.

HRM 550 Labor Law, Compliance and Risk Management

This course is designed to develop student understanding of the HR legal environment and develop student skills in interpreting and implementing HR law. It will review and discuss current legal issues affecting the human resource function, including employment-at-will, EEO, OSHA, DOL, and Supreme Court decisions. It will also address the implementation of HR law through topics such as regulatory and legal compliance training, risk management strategies and workplace safety and securing information systems. Class discussion and topics will seek to apply to human resources scenarios from the employer and employee perspective.

HRM 610 Learning and Development

This course focuses on the functions of learning theories as it pertains to developing and implementing training for different audiences (level in the organization, education background, generation, etc.) in organizations. This course connects theory and application in organizational needs assessment, evaluation and measuring impact, learning management systems and online learning. Additionally, the course explores training as part of an overall employee career development process. 

HRM 620 Change Leadership and Facilitation for Resilience

Adaptive capacity is a leadership essential necessary to mobilize individuals through challenges. The skills of observation, interpretation, and intervention serve many HR functions and are essential organizational tools that promote innovation and sustainability. The course will equip students with the strategies and practical skills needed to mobilize organizational change and help individuals and groups work creatively and effectively. Students will differentiate among practices of coaching, consulting, and facilitating and explore their role in supporting equitable and inclusive change strategies. This course is practice-oriented, emphasizing student participation and career application.

HRM 630 HR Analytics and Evaluation

This course exposes participants to the use of analytics to make decisions about talent and the organization as well as demonstrate the value of Human Resources. The course will examine tools, skills, and technologies needed to make evidence-based decisions on HR and organizational performance including types of data, HR and business metrics, data analysis and interpretation, reporting analyses to decision makers, and ethical considerations. Participants will examine quantitative and qualitative research methods to inform strategic business decisions. The course will explore the role of human resource information systems (HRIS) in delivering HR services. The course will be taught with a focus on application using case study and scenario approaches. 

HRM 680 Human Resource Leadership

This course serves as a capstone course to draw together student learning throughout the program. In this role, students will reflect on and develop their personal leadership identity as an HR professional and their organizational role as ethical leaders. An emphasis on executive presence and communicating effectively as a leader will be addressed.  The primary deliverable for the course is an applied project that diagnoses, analyzes and provides recommendations and a leadership strategy for an HR problem in an organization. 

OLS 515 Intro to Leadership Theory

The Leadership studies field is a vibrant and changing landscape. Over the past two centuries it has enjoyed significant growth, renewed scrutiny and increasing public visibility. This course explores key leadership paradigms of this dynamic landscape and interrogates their associated skills, tools and practices. Tapping into the dual streams of both popular culture and academic literature, we will track how these leadership paradigms have emerged from real life contexts and particular historical circumstances. We will analyze and critique the purposes and change processes employed by these paradigms and give attention to how their strategies can be applied in our contemporary organizational settings. Through an engaged pedagogy involving case study analysis and scenario building, participants will grow their leadership expertise by refining and expanding their tactical and problem-solving abilities. Armed with an overview of the primary concepts, metrics and tools of the leadership field, this course equips participants with strategic and practical skills to take on increasingly challenging leadership roles in the decades ahead.

OLS 530 Organizational Behavior

All organizations are organic, interconnected systems that take on a life of their own regardless of the individuals that occupy various roles in the system.  Leaders need to understand their organizational systems and the behavior of those systems if they hope to effectively lead or change them.  This course will explore organizational behavior from the intrapersonal level to the systems level, including concepts of change and conflict.  It will rely heavily on student participation and case studies.