Starting out

Mary Grace NevilleAugust 14, 2016August 21, 2016Al Akhawayn University

Al Akhawayn University, in Ifrane Morocco, attracts undergraduate and masters Moroccan and international students studying predominately applied majors (including business and engineering) in a liberal arts context. The mission? To build citizen-leaders of tomorrow. That aligns with my beliefs. Our world is so incredibly interdependent (not just inter-connected any longer) and so complex (culturally, socio-economically, ecologically, etc), that wherever possible, people benefit from learning how to learn — not just memorize, but intrinsically learning how to reflect, consider, inquire, imagine, grasp, absorb, digest.

That’s easier to say than to learn to “do.” It’s a process. It’s what “liberal arts” is about — increasing people’s capacity to responsibly engage each other (and therefore engage in creating healthy societies).

Learning business, computer science or engineering in a liberal arts environment ideally means that students and faculty are approaching their respective content areas with an intention of breathing history, philosophy, literatures, art, science into their thinking so that their choices — especially in the future — go far beyond recitation of what they’ve been told. Choices become grounded in reflection, analysis, critique, and consideration of the implications from multiple perspectives. It is in these ways that I believe business education can become exponentially beneficial to society, when business education infuses its process and its content with an intention to build high integrity citizen-leaders.

And so I join the young Al Akhawayn faculty to learn more about how to learn, and therefore what and how to teach. In this blog, I’ll share my experiences of that process.

Published by Mary Grace Neville

I teach, practice, and research positive change, especially as it occurs through people in business (and therefore in business education!) acting as agents of world benefit. My formal training includes a strategic management MBA, organizational behavior PhD, and extensive study in Gestalt psychology; while my professional experiential learning spans non-profit administration, corporate change-strategy consulting, and higher education. What does all of that mean? It means I carry passion for making our highly interdependent and global world a better place. Because businesses shape so much about our choices and priorities and values, I focus on shifting how business happens. Specifically, I teach undergraduates business from the belief that everyone carries responsibility for engaging in making business actions responsible (meaning, analytical yes, but also meaning compassionate and heart filled too). I advocate that we are all better off when each of us learns to imagine, to honor each other even in disagreement, to ask questions and to hold ideas lightly enough that the ideas can grow. This requires diverse skills -- leading, following, inquiring, listening, analyzing, reflecting from multiple perspectives, scaling ideas in like a microscope and out like a telescope to explore implications, seeking to understand oneself as well as others, imagining, building, redesigning, etc. That's much more to learn than just what's written in a text book! Business can be a great lever for positive change. But many are overly focused on quick routes to short-term financial profit maximization. Businesses can also do "good" while doing financially well -- the concepts can co-exist. But we need large scale consciousness change in order for that positive influence to become mainstream. I teach because doing so allows me to build relationships with leaders (both the future's "big L" leaders who will be in charge of businesses, and the "little l" leaders who shape our daily life simply because they influence others as they make their own choices and moral actions). Rather than try to change giant, amorphous entities (like an entire multinational corporation all at once), I choose to work with individuals to change and expand how individuals conceptualize business and success. Together, individuals ultimately ripple out to change large scale beliefs over time. Managing our lives in generative ways -- ways that foster growth in collective well being, innovation for societal improvement, and imagination of our most hopeful futures -- we make a positive difference, step by step. I hope you'll make this true in your own life! View all posts by Mary Grace Neville

2 Comments

Kathy KERR says:

August 22, 2016 at 2:24 pm

Wow, that’s amazingly beautiful!

LikeLike

Reply
georgiannehewett says:

August 20, 2016 at 12:59 pm

Love this line, MG. “Managing our lives in generative ways — ways that foster growth in collective well being, innovation for societal improvement, and imagination of our most hopeful futures — we make a positive difference, step by step.” Yes!!!

LikeLike

Reply

Published by Mary Grace Neville

2 Comments

Leave a Reply Cancel reply