“Picture a lecture session at a business school and you probably envisage students gazing at screens filled with equations and acronyms,” reads an unsigned Saturday (12/8) article in the Economist (U.K.). “What you might not expect is choristers attempting to sing ‘O clap your hands,’ an eight-part anthem composed by Orlando Gibbons and first performed in 1622, [with] MBA students [at] Saïd Business School in Oxford … conducting the choir…. The session, organized by Pegram Harrison, a senior fellow in entrepreneurship, cleverly allowed the students to absorb some important leadership lessons. For example, leaders should listen to their teams, especially when their colleagues have specialist knowledge…. Other business schools have also realized that their students can learn from the arts. At Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Leanne Meyer has introduced a leadership-training program that includes poetry, art installations and a book club…. The Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts (RADA) … offers training courses for executives, ranging from half a day to six days…. Says Charlie Walker-Wise, one of RADA’s tutors. ‘We help people to become more aware of their habits; what they do without realizing it.… Not many people are aware of how they come across.’ ”
Posted December 11, 2019
