I'm Barbara O'Keefe and I'm the Dean of Northwestern School of Communication.
My colleagues and I are very pleased to have joined with three
other Northwestern schools to build this specialization in leadership.
It's the kind of topic that requires inter disciplinary study and teaching.
But at the same time,
it's a wonderful showcase through the research we do in our field.
As a social scientist who studies communication processes and
practices in the workplace, I'm acutely aware of the connection
between well-executed communication and effective leadership.
As a leader you need to be able to articulate an effective vision for
your organization, and help others adopt and implement it.
And while these days a leader has many possible ways of sharing ideas with others
in his or her organization.
In the end a leader's effectiveness will turn on the ability to influence others
through persuasion.
In the social influence course the specialization requires, Daniel O'Keefe
will present the best contemporary scholarship on changing attitudes,
beliefs, and behavior.
This research helps a leader think through communication tasks and
identify what does and what does not need to be changed,
in order to implement a new vision for the organization.
If you know what your real communication task is,
naturally you can make better decisions about how to accomplish it.
And now we have a wealth of research on how to best pursue each of the distinctive
types of objectives you might have, as you attempt to influence your community.
The social influence course will also take you through all of these options.