Management Teaching Review

Helping students connect abstract concepts to concrete situations is often a challenge. Students who are unable to make the basic connections are at risk of spending the semester and beyond misunderstanding key points and their application. In this article, we provide a framework that includes debriefing, bridge building, and assimilation to help mitigate the challenge of making the abstract, concrete. We use “It’s a Puzzle,” a fast-paced group activity based on principles of experiential learning theory, to illustrate how we use this framework to help students understand and apply self-organization concepts to concrete situations. “It’s a Puzzle” provides participants with an opportunity to experience self-organization as a group, to reflect on the self-organizing interaction from the perspective of self and group, and to apply the learning experience to self-organization concepts. We have successfully used this activity as an introduction to self-organization at both the undergraduate and graduate level.

Reframing is the ability to identify and significantly change assumptions or perspectives. It is a powerful skill but can be difficult to learn and apply. This article presents two experiential exercises for teaching reframing in negotiations: the Rental Home case and the Multiplex Saw case. These exercises are designed to produce frame-shifting experiences (“aha” moments). The Rental Home case focuses broadly on the frames about the accuracy of perceptions. More specifically, there is a natural human bias toward believing that “reality is what I see” versus “much of what I believe is objective reality is actually just my perception.” The Multiplex Saw case focuses on frames related to inventing options for mutual gain or what might be described as “expanding the pie.” People tend to be biased toward framing negotiations as zero sum, which inhibits their ability to engage in creative, integrative bargaining.

Work motivation has long been considered a driving force behind optimal employee management. However, as the workscape continues its path toward increased globalization, today’s managers must consider cultural influences on employee motivation to implement the most appropriate human capital management strategies within any given context. The classroom exercise described herein challenges students to do just that. This exercise allows students to consider how employees’ culture may interact with their motivations in specific job-relevant contexts, challenging them to develop a culturally considerate motivation plan to drive their employees toward an organizationally desired outcome. As such, the exercise is appropriate for a variety of courses (e.g., Human Resource Management, Work Motivation, Organizational Behavior) at both undergraduate and graduate levels, and options are presented at each stage of the exercise that may be in/excluded at the discretion of the instructor depending on course level and focus.

Creativity is more important than ever in today’s knowledge-based economy. Although many students doubt their own creativity, very few exercises are designed to help them access this ability. We believe that self-expression and self-reflection are important for understanding personal creative ability. Jung introduced the mandala to promote these two skills. We offer an easy-to-implement project that uses the mandala to help students explore factors (e.g., moods, context) that affect their creativity. This project can be useful in a variety of courses, ranging from those that give students a basic overview of creativity (e.g., management, organizational behavior) to more advanced courses in creativity and innovation.

Simulations have been developed for many business courses because of enhanced student engagement and learning. A challenge for instructors using simulations is how to take this learning to the next level since student reflection and learning can vary. This article describes how to use a conceptual mapping game at the beginning and end of a simulation as an instructional scaffold that encourages students to reflect on the connections between their decisions and the outcomes in the simulation. Asking student simulation teams to create team mental maps enhances discovery and learner-directed learning and is supported by research finding that group debriefing methods are best for group-level activities.

Tarsia Formulator is a software package that enables management teachers to create innovative and engaging learning materials that test understanding. Available freely on the Internet via Hermitech Laboratory, it is widely used in the United Kingdom in the school sector. The author has used Tarsia in management classes and has received very positive comments from both undergraduate and MBA students who see it as a fun activity that really stretches their capacity to recall information and think logically. Tarsia can generate a range of puzzles that can serve as a way of consolidating knowledge for small groups of two to three students, or as a summation exercise at the end of a half-day session.

The use of stories in business ethics education is arguably as old as business ethics education. Recent advances in the psychology of stories show us how stories promote consideration of the human impact of business activity. While several books, journal articles, and other sources provide resource lists of novels and dramas for business ethics education, they tend to draw from a common well of material in the Western canon. Using criteria of length, quality, and relevance, this article provides a list of 12 recommended novels for business ethics education whose authors or characters resemble the diverse participants in 21st-century global capitalism, particularly women and emerging market actors.