Global Strategic Leadership

The Wharton School

Leadership and Management

About Programme

As recent events have made abundantly clear, the world is more interconnected — in terms of markets, suppliers, customers, and operations — than ever before. What happens “over there” can have an immediate, and even dire, impact “over here.” Thriving companies acknowledge this environment, and position themselves to identify and take advantage of opportunities in multiple geographies. They also often do so well ahead of their competition.

In Global Strategic Leadership, Wharton faculty will help you understand the complex economic, demographic, and political forces shaping and reshaping the business landscape. You will hone your ability to anticipate future trends in your industry, in technology, and in a global context; and to assess the possibilities and challenges arising in markets around the world. The program will show you how to transform your current international business strategy while strengthening the specific leadership skills you need to execute on them.

Programme Content

Leading your organization to stay steps ahead of change, instead of simply keeping up, means knowing where to look, being able to pick up on early signals, and taking advantage of opportunities in new and distant geographies. Even leaders in single markets experience and need to manage international influences on their operations. Global Strategic Leadership will equip you with tested tools and frameworks you can use to create greater value and enhance your position as a market-leading organization.

Wharton faculty — led by Harbir Singh, co-director of the William and Phyllis Mack Institute for Innovation Management — apply their latest research, experience with some of the world’s most successful companies, and strategic insights to help you broaden your perspective on how to lead and compete in a global business landscape.

They use a series of methodologies to help you understand the economic, industry level, and globally relevant drivers of competitive advantage. Other sessions explore new approaches for leadership team building, strategy execution, scenario planning, the role of values and ethics in global leadership, and development and communication of a compelling vision to drive your organization forward.

This program provides a comprehensive approach to strategy development. It stresses the importance of flexibility, emphasizing open-mindedness, agility and creativity, which are critical for success in a global context. It helps clarify and enhance your strategic thinking and ability to create and communicate a sustainable vision of the future for your organization.

Overall, you will learn how to:

Gain deeper insight into the global business environment and how to lead your organization across geographic boundaries

Understand the economic, business, and other drivers that create and sustain competitive advantage

Scenario plan to anticipate the future and develop a compelling vision to drive your organization forward

Programme Audience

Global Strategic Leadership is designed for highly accomplished senior executives who cross a variety of industry verticals and business disciplines and are regionally and culturally diverse. They have included presidents, chief executive officers, and other senior executives, as well as entrepreneurs, media executives, and leaders of nonprofit organizations.

Participants leave the program with an expanded peer network, plus specific tools and frameworks they can use to make a meaningful strategic impact within their companies or organizations.

Fluency in English, written and spoken, is required for participation in Wharton Executive Education programs unless otherwise indicated.

Participants by Industry

Participants by Job Function

Participants by Region

This program is held at the Steinberg Conference Center located on the University of Pennsylvania campus in Philadelphia. Meals and accommodations are included in the program fees. Learn more about planning your stay at Wharton’s Philadelphia campus .

To further leverage the value and impact of this program, we encourage companies to send cross-functional teams of executives to Wharton. We offer group-enrollment benefits to companies sending four or more participants.

Programme Benefits

Increase your capacity to formulate and execute global strategy

Build capabilities for leading and serving customers across national and international boundaries

Generate counterintuitive ideas around changing geopolitical realities

Engage in best-case/worst-case scenario planning to map out future situations that could affect your industry or organization

Testimonials

"I’ve worked in the power sector my entire career. When I joined Cuestamoras in 2014, it was to establish an energy company and grow the business regionally in Central America and Mexico. I’m now faced with putting together a leadership team that will be able to rethink how we are going to compete over the next five to 10 years. We’ve doubled in size in the last 12 months and will double in size again in the next 12 months. We are bringing in a lot of new people across multiple countries in Latin America. We need to provide a clear vision of where we’re going and provide opportunities to empower people. Key takeaways from Wharton Global Strategic Leadership were the discussions around emotional intelligence and persuasion and influencing. As a senior manager and a team leader, my work is much more that of facilitator and motivator than somebody doing all the number crunching. The emotional intelligence and influencing teachings were helpful because of the cross-cultural and international dynamics I deal with on my team. For me, focusing on how to get people in each country to come together and stay focused and motivated even though we often don’t have face-to-face contact is a challenge. Executives who would be ideal for this program include people at higher management levels who manage multiple locations, or established executives in large companies where their incumbent status is not making them compete effectively. There are some major leadership challenges in trying to refocus management teams to give the organization more vitality and vigilance, so they can compete better."

Lisa Larson

Associate Vice President, HDR Inc.

"As a senior officer at the National Academy of Medicine, I help develop, launch and oversee programs out of the president’s office and ensure resources of the Academy are there to support new programmatic efforts. I took Global Strategic Leadership to get a handle on how to run a global initiative — which at the time was a $3.5 million, three-year project that looked at how nine different countries were investing in young children. I got much more from Wharton than insights to help me in this one program. I was surrounded by really smart leaders from many different types of organizations who inspired me to embrace a whole different level of thinking at the organizational level. Six months after returning from Wharton, the Academy launched our Innovation to Incubation program. The idea for this program came from my time at Wharton. Our organization puts out consensus reports with authoritative recommendations, but once the science is out there, the consensus committees disband, and the staff moves on to the next project. I thought that there was so much more we could do. As an independent, neutral convening body, I realized that the Academy could incubate’ the recommendations — that is, work with key stakeholders on the ground to pull in new voices who could take the recommendations forward. The incubation idea was integral from my experience at Wharton. If I was just at the Academy doing my [day-to-day] roles, I wouldn’t have had the time, the space, or the intellectual energy to think outside my own box."

Alden Kitson

Managing Director, Cuestamoras Energía, Guatemala

"Wharton’s Global Strategic Leadership program helped me think through some of the dynamics of leading both emerging and established countries. It was very relevant to my job since I’m responsible for both Canada and Latin America countries for Zoetis. Wharton shared a great example of what global automaker Ford went through when it produced the Ford Focus for the India market. I learned the importance of staying with your core but adapting to a global culture."

Kimber Bogard

Senior Vice President of Strategy and Programs, The New York Academy of Medicine

"My biggest take-away from Global Strategic Leadership was learning about my position as a promoter and how to leverage this aspect of my personality for the benefit of my organization and building my own social capital."

Joyce Lee

Executive Vice President, Area President, Zoetis, Inc., worlds largest producer of medicine and vaccinations for pets and livestock

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Shelly Reinagel

Program Director, United Soybean Board

Testimonial Source