“Leadership Cannot Be Taught”: Teaching Leadership to MPA Students

Abstract

This article presents an approach to teaching leadership that employs in-class exercises to build three sets of skills: decision-making, collaboration, and negotiation. It provides a detailed explanation of these teaching techniques based on 11 years of experience with MPA students, highlighting the benefits of the appropriate sequencing of games, the use of debriefing as a pedagogical tool, and the value of patient observation and risk-taking by the instructor. The success of the approach is assessed with student survey data.