SIS 101.001 AND SIS 101.002
LEADERSHIP GATEWAY
FALL 2006
Nanette S. Levinson, Associate Professor
School of International Service
McCabe 206
202-885-1480
nlevins@american.edu
Faculty Assistants/Program Associates:
Jaclyn Burger
Elisabeth Johnson
Shira Zamir
Office Hours:
LOCATION : SIS Building, 3rd Floor, At Long Table
Jaclyn Burger, Wednesdays, 12:00 -1:00 p.m.
Elisabeth Johnson, Mondays, 4:30 - 5:30 p.m.
Shira Zamir, Wednesdays, 4:00 – 5:30 p.m.
DESCRIPTION
“Great leaders catalyze action; they serve as the template for driving alignment
and creating a sense of purpose in the seeming chaos and
complexity of human organization.” - Watkins, 2006
This one credit class serves as the gateway to leadership studies in the School of
International Service. It builds on the SIS legacy of leadership in all sectors and
all parts of the world and on the School’s distinctive commitment to service.
Required for the Class of 2010, it provides a foundation for understanding and
practicing leadership in this new and complex era of international affairs. It is
neither an introductory survey nor a comprehensive treatment of these topics.
Rather it focuses on selected leadership skills and understandings requisite for
this new era of extraordinary opportunity for international leadership.
COURSE REQUIREMENTS
Students must complete the assigned readings prior to each lecture/discussion
section. In addition, students need to have read the assigned case carefully prior
to their first team meeting and participate actively in the assigned teamwork.
There will be a sheet for team members to assess the work of the team
(excluding their own contributions).
There is both a required individual assignment and a required team assignment
for SIS 101. For the individual independent research assignment, students need
to select a minimum of five readings from the recommended reading list and
incorporate what they have learned from these readings in this assignment. The
course will use Blackboard, accessible at http://blackboard.american.edu .
COURSE GRADING
The course is graded on a pass-fail basis. There is also an option to earn an SIS
Leadership Gateway Certificate of Distinction to recognize outstanding
performance in SIS 101. The standards are:

Certificate of Distinction: consistently superior work; commands attention
in its own right; clear familiarity with the concepts from the course and the
effective use of these concepts; superior communication skills; creativity.

Pass: good work in meeting the course requirements with competence;
respectful participation in teamwork including individual contributions to
the team and in meeting team deadlines.

Fail: inadequate performance in meeting course requirements including
failure to submit assignments on time (without doctor’s notification);
absence of contributions and lack of or weak participation in team work;
serious errors in substance or in communication.
TEAMWORK
Students will receive their team assignments on September 13, 2006 and will
receive their case assignments at that time. Each faculty assistant will be the
program associate responsible for a group of teams. J. Burger’s teams will be the
purple teams; E. Johnson’s teams will be the red teams; and S. Zamir’s teams
will be the blue teams. Team assignment is on a random basis and permanent
for Fall 2006; students cannot switch teams. Please address any questions or
issues to your Program Associate. Their emails and office hours are highlighted
above.
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SCHEDULE AT A GLANCE
September 6
September 13
September 20
September 27
October 4
October 11
October 18
October 25
November 1
November 15
November 15
November 29
December 4
First Lecture/Discussion
Second Lecture/Discussion
Teamwork I In Class
Welcome Hours In Class/Prof. Levinson/Assoc.
Teamwork II in Class
Teamwork III in Class
Third Lecture/Discussion
Teamwork IV in Class
Teamwork V in Class
Concluding Lecture/Discussion
Team Assignment Due to Progr. Associate
Welcome Hours In Class
Individual Assignment Due to Progr. Associate
Required Readings

Naim,Moises. Illicit: How Smugglers, Traffickers and Copycats Are
Hijacking the Global Economy, Random House, 2005.

THE SOCIAL ENTREPRENEURS CASE

Five selections from the Recommended Readings List below (must
include a balance of writings focused on public and private sectors and at
least one book)
Recommended Readings
Amabile, T. M. 1996. Creativity in Context. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press.
Austin, James E., Ezequiel Reficco, Gabriel Berger, Rosa Maria Fischer, Roberto
Gutierrez, Mladen Koljatic, Gerardo Lozano, and Enrique
Ogliastri. 2004. Social Partnering in Latin America .
Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Adler, Nancy J. 1996. Global Woman Political Leaders: An Invisible History, An
Increasingly Important Future. Leadership Quarterly 7(1): 33161.
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Badaracco, Joseph L., Jr. 2002. Leading Quietly. Boston: Harvard Business
School Press.
Bell, Derrick. 2002. Ethical Ambition: Living a Life of Meaning and Worth. New
York: Bloomsbury.
Choi, Y.; Mai-Dalton R.R. 1998. On The Leadership Function of Self-sacrifice.
The Leadership Quarterly, 9 (4): 475-501.
Coles, Robert. 1993. The Call of Service: A Witness to Idealism. Boston:
Houghton Mifflin Co.
Coles, Robert, ed. 2005. Political Leadership. New York: Random House.
Conger, Jay. 1998. The Necessary Art of Persuasion. Harvard Business Review
76 (3): 84-98.
Copeland, Lewis and Lawrence W. Lamm, eds. 1973. The World’s Great
Speeches. 3d enl. ed. New York: Dover Publications.
Erik H. Erikson. 1969. Gandhi’s Truth: On the Origins of Militant Nonviolence
New York: WW Norton & Company
Gardner, Howard. 2004. Changing Minds: The Art and Science of Changing Our
Own and Other Peoples Minds. Boston: Harvard Business
School Press.
George, William W. 2003. Authentic Leadership: Rediscovering the Secrets to
Creating Lasting Value. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Gerber, Robin. 2003. Leadership the Eleanor Roosevelt Way: Timeless
Strategies From the First Lady of Courage. New York:
Portfolio.
Gerzon, Mark. 2006. Leading Through Conflict: How Successful Leaders
Transform Differences Into Opportunities. Boston: Harvard
Business School.
Goleman, Daniel. 2000. Leadership That Gets Results. Harvard Business
Review 78(2):78-90.
Heifetz, Ronald A., John V. Kania, and Mark R. Kramer. Winter 2004. Leading
Boldly. Stanford Social Innovation Review: 21-31.
Heifetz, Ronald. 1994. Leadership Without Easy Answers. Cambridge:
Belknap/Harvard University Press.
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Hogan, Robert and Robert B. Kaiser. 2005. What We Know About Leadership.
Review of General Psychology 9(2): 169-180.
Javidan, Mansour and Robert J. House. Spring 2001. Cultural Acumen for the
Global Manager: Lessons from Project GLOBE.
Organizational Dynamics 29(4): 289-304.
Katzenbach, Jon R. 1998. Teams At the Top: Unleashing The Potential of Both
Teams and Individual Leaders. Boston: Harvard Business
School Press.
Keohane, Nannerl. 2005. On Leadership. Perspectives on Politics 3(4): 705-722.
King, Martin Luther, Jr. 1994. Letter From the Birmingham Jail. San Francisco:
Harper.
Kotter, John P. and D.S. Cohen. 2002. The Heart of Change: Real-Life Stories of
How People Change Their Organizations. Cambridge.
Harvard Business School Press.
Machiavelli, Niccolo. 1999. The Prince: A New Translation. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press.
Mandela, Nelson R. 1994. Long Walk to Freedom. Boston: Little, Brown and
Company.
Orr, Sarah S., and Ronald E. Riggio, eds. 2004. Improving Leadership in
Nonprofit Organizations. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Outcalt, Charles L., Shannon K. Faris, and Kathleen N. McMahon, eds. 2001.
Developing Non-hierarchical Leadership on Campus : Case
Studies and Best Practices in Higher Education. London :
Greenwood Press.
Pittinsky, Todd L. and Christopher J. Tyson. 2005. “Leader Authenticity Makers:
Finding From a Study of African-American Leaders.” In
William L. Gardner, ed., Authentic Leadership Theory and
Practice: Origins, Effects and Development. Amsterdam:
Oxford.
Radin, Beryl A. 2000. Beyond Machiavelli: Policy Analysis Comes of Age.
Washington: Georgetown University Press.
Sussman, Carl. Winter 2003. Making Change: How to Build Adaptive Capacity.
The Nonprofit Quarterly 10(4): 19-24.
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Tannen, Deborah. 1998. The Argument Culture: Moving From Debate to
Dialogue. New York: Random House.
Tichy, Noel. 1997. The Leadership Engine: How Winning Companies Build
Leaders At Every Level. New York: HarperCollins.
Tyler, T. 2002. Leadership and Cooperation in Groups. American Behavioral
Scientist 45(2): 769-789.
Watkins, Michael. 2006. Shaping the Game: The New Leader’s Guide to
Effective Negotiating. Boston: Harvard Business School
Press.
Individual Assignment: Independent Research
Due Date: Monday, December 4, 2006
Length: Word-processed, Double- spaced, 5- 7 pages
Format: Long Op-Ed Format
(With endnotes for your references per
American Political Science Review style;
See hints on formatting your Op-Ed on Blackboard!)




Select 2-3 leaders who are either heads of government or international
organizations or nonprofit organizations or corporations anywhere in the
world.
Identify what you see as the most distinctive characteristics of their
leadership
Link your findings to a minimum of 5 of the recommended readings you
selected to be your required readings
Link to those qualities you identify as key for leaders of your generation
and compellingly convey your message!
Team Assignment
Due Date: Wednesday, November 15, 2006
You will receive your own assignment to a specific team on September 13, 2006.
At that class, you will also receive the assignment for your Team and for Team
Meetings I-V. All team meetings will take place in Ward 1 and Ward 2 from 5:306:35pm or in Ward 1 from 6:45- 7:50 pm. on specified class dates. See Schedule
above as well as your Team Assignment list. Note that each team as a part of its
final assignment will be doing one ten minute podcast!! All team podcasts will be
placed on our Blackboard site.
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Academic Integrity Code Statement Overview
All students are governed by American University's Academic Integrity Code.
The Academic Integrity Code details specific violations of ethical conduct that
relate to academic integrity. By registering, you have acknowledged your
awareness of the Academic Integrity Code, and you are obliged to become
familiar with your rights and responsibilities as defined by the code. All of your
work (whether oral or written) in any and all classes is governed by the provisions
of the Academic Integrity Code. Academic violations include but are not limited
to: plagiarism, inappropriate collaboration, dishonesty in examinations whether in
class or take-home, dishonesty in papers, work done for one course and
submitted to another, deliberate falsification of data, interference with other
students' work, and copyright violations. The adjudication process and possible
penalties are listed in American University's Academic Integrity Code booklet,
and is also available on the American University website. Being a member of
this academic community entitles each of us to a wide degree of freedom and the
pursuit of scholarly interests; with that freedom, however, comes a responsibility
to uphold the high ethical standards of scholarly conduct.
Welcome Hours In Class!
On the evenings specified in the Schedule above, Professor Levinson as well as
the Program Associates will be available in Ward 1 at 5:30 p.m. to meet
individually with you, should you have any questions or if you would just like to
stop by. Professor Levinson is also available in Ward 1 after each
lecture/discussion class meeting. Additionally, the Program Associates have
weekly office hours outside of class as well as from 6:35- 8:00 pm in Ward 1 to
meet with you; they are available also by e-mail to answer questions or provide
assistance. Please see the listings at the top of this Syllabus.
Lecture/Discussion Overview
September 6
Class Lecture/Discussion I
Introduction to Leadership Gateway and Leadership Gateway Faculty Team
Discussion of Syllabus and Course Requirements
Toast to the Class of 2010 (Leaders & Toasts, Tributes & Eulogies…)
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September 13
Class Lecture/Discussion II
Special Guest Lecturer: The 2006 Leadership Gateway Author: Dr. Moises Naim,
Executive Editor of Foreign Policy and of Illicit: How Smugglers, Traffickers and
Copycats Are Hijacking the Global Economy, 2005.
October 18
Class Lecture/Discussion III
Leadership and Diplomacy
November 15
Class Lecture/Discussion IV
Leadership, Culture, and Communication: Next Steps and Through The
Gateway!
Due Date for TEAMWORK!
December 4
No Class Meeting
Due Date for Individual Assignment!
Selected Links for SIS 101
http://www.hbs.edu/leadership/database/index.html (a database on 20th
Century Great American Business Leaders)
http://www.podcastdirectory.com/podcasts/1919 (a listing of historical speeches
in podcast format)
Additional links available on the SIS 101 Blackboard site
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