Aligning a Foundation Management Course for Undergraduates with Principles of Positive Psychology

When the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania revised its curriculum in 1991, a team of faculty and staff created an experimental course designed to cultivate leadership, teamwork, and communication skills through service. Since 1993, all incoming and transfer undergraduate students at Wharton have taken Management 100: Leadership and Communication in Groups as a foundation for their standard core requirements. This paper explores opportunities to align the course with several key principles of Positive Psychology. A proposal is made to modify the Management 100 syllabus to include a more concentrated focus on character strengths, incorporate pre-course and in-course assignments to build skills in resilience, and add a post-course application of the Appreciative Inquiry process to enhance constituent feedback and course improvement. Through these structural and pedagogical changes, Management 100, already widely emulated and recognized as an exemplary course, will be both broadened and strengthened. Incoming students will benefit from the introduction and application of the extraordinary depth of empirical findings and research-based principles of Positive Psychology. It is anticipated that staff, faculty, and administration will enjoy similar benefits.