Curriculum and Courses
Course Descriptions
This section lists general descriptions of courses offered. The curriculum of required and elective courses is subject to change. Our faculty members are committed to tackling emerging HR/LR issues within their areas of expertise; thus, the content and emphases of any given course are at the discretion of the instructor and subject to change.
Students who have recently completed relevant coursework in other graduate programs may be approved to transfer up to six credit hours toward this program.
- Human Resource Strategies and Decisions (LIR 824)
- The primary objective of this course is to provide students with a comprehensive analytical and practical understanding of the various strategic analyses involved and decisions made in developing and implementing HR strategies that yield superior performance in today’s global economy. Students learn how to (a) design high-performance HR systems that optimize employee capabilities, motivation, and opportunities and that (b) align effectively with operational, technology, and business strategies.
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- Collective Bargaining (LIR 858)
- This course provides students with an overview of the broader role and history of unions and union-management relations in society and an understanding of collective bargaining strategies and day-to-day union-management relations. Students learn how to develop and align collective bargaining strategies with HR and business strategies, to apply interest-based and traditional approaches to negotiations, to create joint union-management relationships, and to resolve disputes and build trustworthy relationships.
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- Organizational Behavior for the Management of Human Resources (LIR 823)
- The success of organizations depends on employees' abilities to advance business strategies and to enable group and organizational processes that allow organizations to grow and change in healthy ways. In this course, students learn the managerial and organizational behavior skills required to manage people, resources, and situations effectively across organizational contexts, to use organizational processes to enhance firm performance, and to take the lead as change agents.
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- International & Comparative HR & LR (LIR 854)
- Increasing global integration and the extraordinary expansion of multinational operations around the world raises a host of challenging HR and LR issues. In this course, students learn about diverse industrial relations and business systems, marked by wide-ranging differences in labor market institutions, workplace cultures and norms, employment regulations, and collective bargaining. Within this international context, students learn about key emerging global HR and LR issues and about transnational strategies pursued by companies and unions.
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- Employment Law (LIR 868)
- The objective of this course is to enable students to evaluate HR policies against principles of employment law. Students learn about laws and policies designed to protect equal employment opportunities (e.g., civil rights, disabilities, and family leave) and to compensate employees for occupational injuries and illnesses. Students also learn legal principles affecting employee rights to privacy, restricting employment-at-will policies, and restraining an organization's right to screen employees for drugs and alcohol.
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- Labor Law (LIR 863)
- This course provides students with a working knowledge of the legal rights and obligations of employers, employees, and unions regarding union representation, organizing, the negotiation of agreements, and the administration of contracts. Students learn about the process of adjudication of unfair labor practice charges, the roles of presidential appointments, administrative decisions, judicial rulings, how to assess the implications of labor law on HR, and collective bargaining strategies and practices.
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- Compensation and Benefit Systems (LIR 825)
- Compensation and benefit systems are critical to attracting, motivating, and rewarding high-talent employees. In this course, students learn about the basic tools and diagnostic approaches used in effective compensation and benefit planning and administration, legal requirements, and how to achieve balance between external equity (what other employers offer), internal equity (what others in the organization receive), and individual equity (self-perceptions of worth and relative contribution).
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- High Performance Work Systems (LIR 827)
- The focus of this course is on high-performance work systems and related management processes (e.g., the “Toyota Production System” and Six Sigma) designed to achieve exceptional performance and the delivery of innovative products and services. Students learn not only the management principles, diagnostic tools, and techniques underpinning these systems and processes, they learn about the high-involvement, commitment-based HR and LR policies and practices essential to the effective application of these systems and processes.
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- Labor Markets (LIR 809)
- This course provides students with an understanding of labor market behavior, structures, factors of supply and demand, and how the dynamics of local and global labor markets affect successful HR and LR management. Students learn how to conduct labor market analyses important to organizational strategies and decision making about hiring, selection and staffing, compensation and benefit plans, training and development, outsourcing and off-shoring, collective bargaining, and policies governing layoffs and retirement.
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- Quantitative Methods for HR & LR (LIR 832)
- Like their counterparts in all other functional areas of an enterprise, HR and LR professionals need to apply business statistics to the decisions they make. This course equips students with the statistical tools needed to make well-informed decisions. Students learn how to conceptualize cause-effect relationships and apply multivariate regression techniques to assessments of the effects of HR and LR practices on measurable outcomes of interest (e.g., performance, returns to training and development, satisfaction, and motivation).
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- Human Resource Metrics and Analysis (LIR 891)
- Like any other decision regarding the allocation of resources, organizations need to evaluate how best to cost-effectively allocate and utilize human resources. This course teaches students how to assess the effectiveness of HR practices in achieving the business and employee outcome goals of organizations. Students learn how to use performance and HR metrics in making assessments and the value-adding business case for alternative workplace policies and practices.
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- Grievance Administration & Arbitration (LIR 865)
- This course provides a comprehensive treatment on how to administer grievance procedures in union-management agreements and how to arbitrate unresolved disputes. Students learn how to investigate grievances, apply due process, critically evaluate merit, participate in hearings as advocates, and prepare briefs for arbitration. Issues examined include discipline and discharge, management rights, compensation and benefits, seniority, past practices, and subcontracting work.
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- HR Information Systems (LIR 828)
- This course provides students with a foundation in the managerial, technical, and functional aspects of HR information systems. Students learn the fundamentals of database management, the basics of HR information system planning and implementation, project management, Web-based information systems, and query and decision support tools. In addition, students receive end-user instruction on how to apply various HR information systems programs.
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- Training & Development (LIR 811)
- In today’s ever-changing global marketplace, marked by continual advancements in technologies and associated management processes, HR and LR professionals must create learning environments to expand the knowledge-based capacities of organizations. In this course, students learn how to conduct needs assessments, how to design effective training and development programs to meet those needs, and how to evaluate the returns to investments in training and development against organizational goals.
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- Organizational Development and Planned Change (LIR 826)
- Organizational change projects are complex and difficult to manage. In this course, students learn how organizational change can occur at individual, group, and organization-wide levels and why even carefully planned change has many unintended consequences. Students analyze organizational change case studies, evaluate causes of failure and factors of success in organizational development projects, and design optimal change interventions.
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- Negotiations & Conflict Resolution (LIR 860)
- The ability to negotiate effectively and to resolve conflicts constructively is valuable for HR and LR professionals. In this course, students learn how to apply alternative strategies, tactics, and processes to negotiations and to manage the key factors that determine success, including planning, communication and persuasion, power, interdependence, resistance, commitment, trust, and third-party interventions.
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- Staffing Organizations (LIR 891)
- In this course, students learn how to design and carry out various staffing activities effectively within labor market and legal constraints. Staffing activities include recruitment (whom to recruit, where and when to recruit, and how to recruit), selection (whom to hire and why), and placement (in which jobs, at what time, and in what career progressions).
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- Globalization and Diversity (LIR 891)
- Rapid globalization is blurring traditional borders of nations, time, and space and, consequently, is challenging existing assumptions about managing organizations and having important implications for transnational HR and LR. In this course, students learn to integrate diverse cultural viewpoints about organizational behavior and HR management (1) to enhance problem solving, firm performance, and leadership abilities and (2) to design systems and policies that promote effective multicultural work environments.
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- HR Business Partners (LIR 891)
- The effectiveness of HR and LR professionals in developing and implementing workplace strategies and in taking on leadership roles as business partners within organizations requires an understanding of operational, marketing, and financial decision making. Designed for students with limited knowledge in business finance, accounting, marketing, and operations, students learn the basic concepts, principles, and parameters applied in these various business functions.
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- Independent Study (LIR 890)
- The primary objective of independent study course work is to allow students the opportunity to focus on HR and LR issues or topics of special interest to them. Under the guidance of faculty, students propose, develop, and carry out projects independently during a given semester. Projects that examine workplace issues of immediate value to one’s employer or in performing one’s current responsibilities are encouraged.
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