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Peak Pioneers Curriculum

P2 meets the learning needs of busy leaders who want solutions and tools to engage their teams, communicate effectively, and improve performance over time. The program is built on a curated collection of best-in-class workplace leadership and performance content, customized to address the current requests of our UC Merced campus leaders. The program focuses on five areas of competency development:

  • Leadership
  • Communication
  • Organization Effectiveness
  • Team Building and Engagement
  • Performance Management

Participant Experience

Participants interact with internal and external experts in faculty and administrators to discuss issues such as the University’s relationship to the state legislature, academic preparation initiatives, capital planning and construction, supervision and management, and perspectives on student services. 

Session Topics and Learning Objectives

Session 1: Personal Leadership –Learning About and Leading Oneself

This session begins before the workshop with a Gallup Strengths and MBTI assessment just to begin the self-reflection. The workshop covers several actionable learning outcomes to help develop yourself as a leader. These learning outcomes include self-reflective and strategic approaches to your career trajectory grounded in your strengths, experiences, and aspirations; identifying and formulating your leadership perspective; developing your leadership timeline; and identification of individual development goals.

Session 2: Leading and Listening – Communication, Communication: is anyone out there?

This session provides overview on communications, theory, practice, models, and troubleshooting. The workshop covers several actionable learning outcomes under communications from effective, to feedback, to determining how, what, why and connecting to leadership moments. Every exchange is an opportunity to improve communication and connection, we’ll explore and examine these discrete skills. Participants will gain practice in communication modes, feedback, recognition, and appreciation as well as crucial conversations.

Session 3: Operational Leadership – Performance, Accountability, and Metrics

This session identifies pathways and skills to getting things done in the workplace. Participants will review the ways in which they can implement, influence, impact, and improve their performance, their teams, their units and their organization. Through exposure to tools, platforms, and processes for improving in small increments and learning from these changes, the participants will review maximizing their performance, increasing accountable actions, and identifying the key measures for assessing what is working, what is not working, and where to make timely changes. We will reframe what it means to be a leader in as much as “leaders ensure the success of their team members” as Lasso says, “it’s not about wins and losses…”

Session 4: Leading Teams – Dynamics, Building, and Developing

This session focuses on the multitude of team considerations. From the dynamics (forming, storming, norming, performing) to building, refining, and developing. Participants will identify strengths, opportunities, roles, team maturity, and strategies to improve their teams and how they participate as a member of a team. The session will review team charters, team tools, teamwork vs. collaboration vs. coordination vs. cooperation and measures for team evaluation. to maximize performance in their team through development discussions, coaching, motivation, and recognition.

For more information:

Please contact hrtraining@ucmerced.edu if you have any questions about the Peak Pioneers Leadership Program.