How to build an organizational behavior course: a complete guide for lecturers

Central question: How do individual, team and organizational forces combine to shape behavior and performance at work?

The most important foundation is not a list of theories but a level-of-analysis habit. Students need to distinguish what is happening inside a person, between people, inside a team, and in the wider system. That prevents every workplace problem from being diagnosed as a personality problem or, at the other extreme, as a culture problem.

What this concept covers

• The scope of Organizational Behavior and its links to psychology, sociology, management and HRM.
• Individual, dyadic, team and organizational levels of analysis.
• Behavior, performance, commitment, learning and well-being as related but distinct outcomes.
• Evidence-based management and the difference between an anecdote, a plausible explanation and defensible evidence.
• The person-situation interaction and why context changes behavior.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Classify workplace evidence by level of analysis.
• Distinguish symptoms from plausible causes.
• Explain why the same outcome can have individual and system-level explanations.
• Frame an OB problem as a testable management question.

How to teach it

• Open with one messy workplace problem and ask groups to diagnose it three ways.
• Build a levels-of-analysis map on the board before introducing specific theories.
• Ask students to separate facts, interpretations and missing evidence in a short case.
• Use the same organization throughout several sessions so students can revise their diagnosis as new concepts are added.

Case-style example

HarborWorks Logistics has 620 employees. One distribution site reports 11% picking errors and 28% annual turnover, versus 4% errors and 14% turnover at a similar site using the same pay bands and technology. Students classify possible causes at individual, team and organization levels, then name two additional data points they would request. One group can defend supervisor quality; another can defend work design. Students discover that identical outcomes can arise from different levels of cause.

Where students struggle

Students often reach for one fashionable explanation and ignore level of analysis. Push them to state which evidence would distinguish competing explanations rather than rewarding the longest list of theories.

Reading and a quick check

Use Robbins and Judge, Chapter 1. Quick check: give five observations and ask students to label the level of analysis and the strongest missing evidence.

Where it leads

The next step is to examine the person side of the model: individual differences, perception and the way people make judgements under uncertainty.

Central question: When should managers adapt to individual differences, and when should they redesign the decision process instead?

Individual differences matter, but good OB teaching avoids turning personality into destiny. Students should learn how values, personality, ability, perception and bias affect behavior while also seeing how selection, task design, incentives and decision rules can reduce predictable errors.

What this concept covers

• Personality, values, ability and person-job or person-organization fit.
• Perception, attribution and common judgement biases.
• Individual decision-making under incomplete information.
• Structured versus intuitive judgement and the value of decision criteria.
• Ethical implications of using individual-difference data in management.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Interpret individual-difference evidence without overclaiming causality.
• Identify perceptual and attribution errors in a management decision.
• Design a more structured decision process.
• Defend when personalization is useful and when standardization is fairer.

How to teach it

• Use a promotion or hiring decision with incomplete and uneven evidence.
• Ask students to score candidates before and after revealing a structured rubric.
• Compare dispositional explanations with situational explanations for the same behavior.
• Discuss the limits of personality tests and algorithmic profiling as management tools.

Case-style example

Beacon Analytics is choosing a new client-team lead. Candidate A has 92% forecast accuracy, a 4.2/5 client score and no formal team-lead experience. Candidate B has 86% accuracy, a 4.8/5 client score and has led two project squads. The manager recently saw B rescue a difficult client meeting. Students score both candidates using a weighted rubric, then compare that result with an intuitive vote. Students discover how recency, criteria and weighting can change a defensible decision.

Where students struggle

Students often name biases after the fact without showing how the bias changes the decision. Require a redesigned process, not just a label.

Reading and a quick check

Use Robbins and Judge, Chapters 5 and 6. Quick check: ask students to rewrite a judgement so it separates observed behavior, attribution and inference.

Where it leads

Once students can analyse individual differences and judgement, they can ask how effort is created and sustained through motivation and job design.

Central question: What makes effort sustainable, and how should a manager redesign work when incentives alone are not enough?

Motivation is easiest to teach when theories are treated as alternative explanations for the same management problem. Students should connect goals, expectancy, fairness, intrinsic motivation and job design to observable choices rather than memorising a list of named theories.

What this concept covers

• Expectancy, goal-setting, equity and self-determination perspectives.
• Intrinsic and extrinsic motivation and the risks of crowding out.
• Job characteristics, autonomy, feedback and meaningfulness.
• Individual versus team incentives and measurement problems.
• Motivation as a dynamic process rather than a fixed trait.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Diagnose a motivation problem using more than one theoretical lens.
• Evaluate an incentive plan for likely behavioral effects.
• Redesign a job to improve motivation without simply increasing pay.
• Defend the trade-offs between individual and collective rewards.

How to teach it

• Give every group the same performance problem but assign different motivational lenses.
• Use a small pay-plan calculation so students see who wins and loses from each design.
• Ask teams to redesign one role around autonomy, feedback, task identity and interdependence.
• Require students to predict unintended behaviors created by a target or bonus.

Case-style example

Northstar Sales pays £40,000 base salary plus a 20% individual commission. Quota attainment is 74% and annual turnover is 31%. A six-person pilot added team bonuses and more pricing autonomy; attainment rose to 81%, but two top sellers said the plan rewarded weaker colleagues. Students calculate expected pay under both plans and recommend an individual-team reward mix. Students discover that a motivation system can improve average performance while creating a fairness problem for high performers.

Where students struggle

Students tend to assume more money equals more motivation. Make them specify the expected mechanism: expectancy, instrumentality, fairness, autonomy, identity or feedback.

Reading and a quick check

Assign Chen and Kanfer (2024) alongside Robbins and Judge, Chapters 7-8. Quick check: ask what one design change would increase motivation without changing total pay.

Where it leads

Motivation affects effort, but employee attitudes, emotions and health determine whether that effort is sustainable.

Central question: How should managers respond when performance problems are intertwined with dissatisfaction, emotion and excessive job demands?

A strong OB course treats well-being as a performance and ethics question, not a soft add-on. Students should distinguish job satisfaction, commitment, affect, burnout, stressors and resources, then judge which interventions address root causes rather than cosmetically improving survey scores.

What this concept covers

• Job satisfaction, commitment, engagement and withdrawal behavior.
• Emotions, moods and emotional labor.
• Job demands, resources, stress, recovery and burnout.
• Absence, turnover and well-being indicators as imperfect evidence.
• Organizational interventions versus individual coping responses.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Interpret attitude and well-being indicators critically.
• Distinguish a demand problem from a resource problem.
• Evaluate individual and organizational interventions.
• Connect employee experience to operational outcomes without reducing people to metrics.

How to teach it

• Use an employee survey with contradictory indicators.
• Ask students to distinguish correlation from causation in satisfaction-performance claims.
• Compare a wellness intervention with a workload or staffing intervention.
• Use a short reflection on emotional labor in customer-facing roles.

Case-style example

WellPath Clinics increased average weekly hours from 36 to 44 during a growth push. Absence rose from 3% to 8%, patient satisfaction fell from 89% to 83%, and annual turnover reached 17%. A £1,500 retention bonus would cost £270,000; hiring six extra staff would cost about £300,000. Students compare demand, resource and incentive explanations and recommend an intervention. Students discover that two similarly priced responses can target very different causes.

Where students struggle

Students sometimes moralise the case or jump immediately to resilience training. Require evidence about job demands, control, staffing and recovery before accepting an individual-level remedy.

Reading and a quick check

Assign Kammeyer-Mueller, Rubenstein and Barnes (2024) and use Robbins and Judge, Chapters 3, 4 and 18. Quick check: ask which indicator would distinguish dissatisfaction from overload.

Where it leads

Individual experience becomes collective performance when people work in teams, especially when diversity and psychological safety affect who speaks and who is heard.

Central question: What allows a diverse team to turn difference into information and performance rather than fragmentation?

Team effectiveness should be taught as a system of composition, interdependence, norms, coordination and voice. Diversity can expand information and perspectives, but it does not guarantee inclusion or performance. Psychological safety is useful here because it focuses attention on whether members can raise concerns, admit uncertainty and challenge assumptions.

What this concept covers

• Team composition, roles, norms, cohesion and interdependence.
• Surface and deep-level diversity and inclusion.
• Psychological safety, voice and error reporting.
• Process losses, social loafing and coordination costs.
• Team effectiveness, learning and collective accountability.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Diagnose team problems using composition and process evidence.
• Distinguish psychological safety from low standards or comfort.
• Design norms that improve voice and accountability.
• Evaluate when diversity is likely to help or hinder performance.

How to teach it

• Run a hidden-information exercise where no individual holds the full answer.
• Compare team performance before and after explicit speaking-up norms.
• Ask students to redesign a meeting so dissent and expertise are easier to surface.
• Use team charters as evidence-based design tools, not decorative contracts.

Case-style example

Arcadia Labs has an eight-person product team across four countries. Quality data show 37 defects were detected during testing, but only 19 were raised before launch. The team scored 3.1/5 on psychological safety and missed the deadline by three weeks. Students map likely process losses and design meeting, escalation and decision norms. One group prioritises faster standardisation; another prioritises more voice. Students discover that diversity creates potential information, while team processes determine whether that information is used.

Where students struggle

Students often treat psychological safety as permission to avoid challenge. Emphasise that high safety can coexist with high accountability and rigorous standards.

Reading and a quick check

Assign Edmondson and Bransby (2023). Quick check: students write one leader behavior that increases voice and one rule that preserves performance standards.

Where it leads

Once the team has the right composition and norms, communication and coordination determine whether work actually moves across boundaries.

Central question: How should organizations design communication when more messages can produce less coordination?

Communication is not just clarity of message. It is also channel choice, timing, shared context, handoffs and information overload. Hybrid work makes those choices visible because teams must decide what needs synchronous interaction, what can be asynchronous and where documentation is essential.

What this concept covers

• Communication processes, channel richness and media choice.
• Information overload, filtering, silence and sensemaking.
• Coordination, handoffs and boundary spanning.
• Hybrid and remote work design.
• Meeting architecture, documentation and asynchronous collaboration.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Match communication channels to task requirements.
• Diagnose coordination failures separately from interpersonal conflict.
• Design a hybrid communication architecture.
• Evaluate trade-offs between responsiveness, focus and transparency.

How to teach it

• Audit a real or fictional team communication week.
• Ask students to classify work as synchronous, asynchronous or documentation-first.
• Run a handoff exercise where information degrades across roles.
• Compare individual preference with task interdependence when choosing hybrid norms.

Case-style example

TransitOne Support has 63 active chat channels and 11 recurring meetings per employee each week. Customer cases are reworked after handoffs 42% of the time, and average response time is nine hours against a four-hour target. Students redesign the channel and meeting architecture with a goal of cutting recurring meeting time by 25% while improving handoff clarity. Students discover that communication volume and coordination quality can move in opposite directions.

Where students struggle

Students frequently prescribe more communication. Require them to state who needs what information, at what point in the workflow, through which channel and for what decision.

Reading and a quick check

Assign Bloom, Han and Liang (2024) and Robbins and Judge, Chapter 11. Quick check: ask students to move three activities between synchronous and asynchronous modes and justify the choice.

Where it leads

Communication systems create the setting in which leadership is enacted. The next concept asks how influence and followership emerge, rather than treating leadership as a list of traits.

Central question: What makes leadership effective in context, and how can students distinguish performance from mere visibility or authority?

Leadership is best taught as a relational and contextual process. Students can compare trait, behavioral, contingency and relational perspectives, but the applied question is always what kind of influence the situation requires and how followers respond.

What this concept covers

• Formal leadership and leadership emergence.
• Trait, behavioral, contingency and relational perspectives.
• Leader-member relationships, trust and followership.
• Coaching, feedback, delegation and development.
• Ethical leadership and the risk of confusing charisma with effectiveness.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Compare leadership approaches against situational demands.
• Evaluate leader effectiveness using multiple outcomes.
• Explain how followers and context shape leadership.
• Design a leadership response that balances task and relationship needs.

How to teach it

• Give students two high-performing managers with different retention and development records.
• Change the task uncertainty and team maturity, then ask whether the same leadership style still fits.
• Use short observation data rather than self-report labels.
• Ask students to define leadership effectiveness before evaluating the leader.

Case-style example

Meridian Retail is choosing a regional manager. Manager X grew sales 8% but has 34% annual turnover. Manager Y grew sales 4% with 12% turnover and promoted three team members. Students score both candidates using performance 40%, retention 25%, development 20% and ethics 15%, then test alternative weights. Students discover that leadership rankings change when the organization changes what it values and that context determines which evidence is decisive.

Where students struggle

Students often search for the universally best leadership style. Keep returning to task, follower, context and outcome criteria.

Reading and a quick check

Assign Gardner, Hanna, Noghani and Cogliser (2024). Quick check: ask students to identify one sign of formal authority and one sign of genuine leadership emergence.

Where it leads

Leadership depends on influence, which leads naturally into power, politics, conflict and negotiation.

Central question: How do dependency, legitimacy and competing interests shape whose arguments carry weight in organizations?

Power and politics are often avoided or taught as inherently negative. A stronger approach treats them as features of interdependence. Students learn to map sources of power, distinguish task conflict from relationship conflict, and negotiate when goals cannot all be satisfied at once.

What this concept covers

• Formal and informal sources of power.
• Dependency, networks, coalitions and organizational politics.
• Task, process and relationship conflict.
• Negotiation, interests, positions and trade-offs.
• Ethical influence and escalation.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Map sources of power in a concrete decision.
• Distinguish constructive conflict from destructive escalation.
• Prepare an interest-based negotiation.
• Evaluate whether a negotiated outcome is effective and governable.

How to teach it

• Use a resource-allocation exercise with asymmetric authority and information.
• Ask students to identify interests separately from stated positions.
• Re-run the negotiation after changing one dependency or veto right.
• Debrief process quality as well as outcome quality.

Case-style example

Solstice Tech must divide a £4.2 million investment pool. Engineering requests £2.4 million, Sales £1.8 million and Compliance £1.1 million. Sales has direct CEO access, while Compliance can block the product release if controls are inadequate. Students map power bases, build coalitions and negotiate a package within the budget. Two allocations can be defended. Students discover that influence follows dependencies, legitimacy and alternatives, not hierarchy alone.

Where students struggle

Students often label politics as bad behavior and miss the underlying resource dependence. Ask what legitimate interests are in conflict before judging tactics.

Reading and a quick check

Use Robbins and Judge, Chapters 13-14. Quick check: students distinguish a position, an interest and a source of power in one sentence each.

Where a simulation fits

The Corporate Governance Simulation can follow this concept as an applied negotiation, especially when the lecturer wants to connect influence and conflict with formal accountability. The simulation goes further than a generic negotiation because CEO, CTO, CCO and Shareholder teams must resolve a conflict of interest and agree future safeguards.

Where it leads

Power and conflict sit inside a wider cultural and ethical context that determines which behaviors are normal, speakable and rewarded.

Central question: How does culture shape what employees notice, say and do when formal rules are incomplete?

Culture becomes useful when students can move beyond slogans. Teach it through artifacts, norms, routines, reward signals, stories and repeated decisions. Add ethics and employee voice so students can ask not only what the organization values, but what people believe is safe and worthwhile to raise.

What this concept covers

• Artifacts, espoused values, assumptions and climate.
• Strong cultures, subcultures and person-organization fit.
• Ethical climate and normalization of questionable behavior.
• Employee voice, silence and speaking-up systems.
• Culture as a source of coordination, identity and blind spots.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Infer cultural patterns from multiple forms of evidence.
• Distinguish culture from climate and brand messaging.
• Evaluate why employees speak up or remain silent.
• Design mechanisms that reinforce ethical voice without creating performative compliance.

How to teach it

• Give students contradictory culture evidence: values statements, promotion decisions and incident data.
• Ask what a newcomer would infer about what really matters.
• Use a voice-system audit covering channels, protection, response and feedback loops.
• Compare a strong culture that coordinates well with one that suppresses weak signals.

Case-style example

Crestline Health targets 12% annual growth. In a staff survey, 74% agree that leaders reward results first, while near-miss reports fell from 48 to 21 even though recorded incidents rose 15%. Students interpret the artifacts, reward signals and voice data, then propose two safeguards. One view is that tighter targets increase focus; another is that they suppress reporting. Students discover that a strong culture can coordinate behavior and simultaneously hide risk.

Where students struggle

Students often diagnose culture from stated values alone. Require at least three forms of evidence, including what receives resources, status or consequences.

Reading and a quick check

Assign Morrison (2023) and Schneider, Ehrhart and Macey (2026). Quick check: students write one artifact, one espoused value and one inferred assumption from the case.

Where it leads

Culture interacts with formal structure and governance. The next concept makes decision rights, accountability and oversight explicit.

Central question: How should decision rights, reporting lines and oversight be designed so that people can act quickly without losing accountability?

Organization charts are only the visible surface of design. Students need to analyse differentiation, integration, centralization, formalization and governance as choices about who decides, who has information, who can challenge a decision and how conflicts of interest are controlled.

What this concept covers

• Functional, divisional, matrix and network structures.
• Centralization, formalization, span of control and coordination mechanisms.
• Decision rights, accountability and escalation.
• Governance, conflicts of interest, fiduciary responsibilities and oversight.
• The behavioral consequences of structure, including ambiguity and duplication.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Compare organization designs against strategic and coordination needs.
• Identify where decision rights or accountability are unclear.
• Evaluate a conflict-of-interest response.
• Design governance safeguards that address both the immediate issue and recurrence risk.

How to teach it

• Ask students to redesign the same company for scale, innovation and regulatory control.
• Use a decision-rights map rather than an organization chart alone.
• Run a boardroom-style case where a high performer creates a governance conflict.
• Separate the immediate personnel decision from the design of future safeguards.

Case-style example

Vertex Mobility has three product lines and six central functions. Major product approvals take 18 days, and duplicated engineering work absorbs an estimated 14% of project hours. At the same time, the CTO owns shares in a competitor valued at £250,000. Students propose a structure and governance response, including decision rights, disclosure and oversight. Students discover that design and governance are both about allocating authority and accountability, not merely drawing reporting lines.

Where students struggle

Students either focus on structure and ignore behavior, or focus on personalities and ignore decision rights. Ask how the design itself changes incentives, information flow and challenge.

Reading and a quick check

Use Robbins and Judge, Chapters 15-16, plus the governance case preparation provided for the simulation. Quick check: students name one decision that should be centralized and one that should be delegated, with a reason.

Where a simulation fits

This is the primary placement for the Corporate Governance Simulation. It is a 3-5 hour role-based team activity for UG, PG and MBA cohorts. CEO, CTO, CCO and Shareholder teams analyse a senior executive conflict of interest, then negotiate both an immediate resolution and future governance safeguards. Place it after students know power, ethics, conflict and basic organization design so the debrief can focus on evidence, proportionality and accountability.

Where it leads

Even well-designed systems must change. Students next examine why people respond differently to change and how organizations learn and adapt.

Central question: Why do people respond differently to the same change, and how should managers adapt the change process when resistance contains useful information?

Change should not be reduced to a stage model. Students need to diagnose readiness, sensemaking, identity, capability, power and local context. Resistance can indicate loss, uncertainty or poor process, but it can also reveal design flaws that senior leaders have not seen.

What this concept covers

• Readiness, change reactions, ambivalence and resistance.
• Sensemaking, communication, participation and local sponsorship.
• Learning, experimentation and feedback loops.
• Change capability and implementation sequencing.
• The role of identity, fairness and power during transformation.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Diagnose different responses to the same change.
• Distinguish lack of capability from lack of commitment.
• Design a sequenced change intervention.
• Use resistance as evidence without assuming all opposition is valid.

How to teach it

• Compare four business units with different adoption rates under the same programme.
• Ask students what evidence would separate skill, incentive and identity explanations.
• Use a pre-mortem on a planned transformation.
• Require a change plan with feedback points where management can revise the intervention.

Case-style example

NorthLake Services is implementing a £6 million ERP system across four regions. Adoption after three months is 72%, 55%, 40% and 33% despite identical training hours. Local sponsor attendance at implementation meetings varies from 92% to 41%. Students diagnose the pattern and sequence three interventions. Finance favors a mandatory cutover; regional leaders favor more piloting. Students discover that apparent resistance can reflect local sponsorship, capability and implementation design rather than a single attitude toward change.

Where students struggle

Students often prescribe more communication without specifying what uncertainty or capability gap the communication is meant to resolve.

Reading and a quick check

Assign Oreg and Sverdlik (2026). Quick check: ask students to identify one sign of low readiness, one sign of low capability and one sign of rational resistance.

Where it leads

The final concept integrates the course by placing organizational decisions inside wider stakeholder and responsible-business trade-offs.

Central question: How should managers balance employee, investor, regulatory and societal demands when a decision changes both financial and human outcomes?

Responsible organizational behavior is a useful capstone because it combines motivation, voice, power, ethics, leadership, conflict, governance and change. The goal is not to teach ESG reporting in detail. It is to make students negotiate what responsible action means when stakeholders value different outcomes and the organization must remain viable.

What this concept covers

• Stakeholder interests, salience and competing claims.
• Responsible business, ESG choices and organizational consequences.
• Workforce, compensation and employment trade-offs.
• Financial viability as a constraint on stakeholder decisions.
• Collective decision-making, legitimacy and accountability.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Map stakeholder interests and sources of influence.
• Evaluate a package of social, environmental and financial choices.
• Negotiate a defensible collective outcome.
• Defend why a responsible decision remains viable and implementable.

How to teach it

• Use a multi-stakeholder package where no single objective can be maximised.
• Require students to quantify at least one financial and one workforce consequence.
• Ask each team to define its non-negotiables before bargaining.
• Debrief whether the best role outcome was also the best organizational outcome.

Case-style example

GreenForge Manufacturing is considering a £12 million filtration upgrade that cuts emissions 35% but adds £1.8 million in annual operating cost. An investor offers £5 million of new capital, while the union seeks a £1 per hour wage increase costing about £2.2 million. Base EBITDA is £25 million and the board sets a £20 million floor. Students build a viable package. Students discover that responsible management is a joint optimisation problem, not a slogan.

Where students struggle

Students may treat stakeholder management as a list of perspectives or assume the ethical choice has no resource constraint. Require a package, an implementation logic and explicit trade-offs.

Reading and a quick check

Use the ESG simulation briefing with the recent culture, motivation, voice and change readings. Quick check: ask students which stakeholder has urgency, legitimacy and power, and how that changes the negotiation.

Where a simulation fits

The ESG Simulation is the secondary capstone fit. Management, Investor, Regulator and Union teams analyse role-specific evidence, model connected choices and negotiate production, environmental, funding, compensation, wage and workforce terms plus an ESG Policy Statement. The complete package must retain EBITDA above $20 million and requires all four stakeholder teams to approve it.

Where it leads

This closes the course. Students should now be able to move from individual and team evidence to organization design, governance, change and stakeholder judgement, while stating what they know, what they infer and what evidence is still missing.

10-week course structure

Compress by combining adjacent individual-level topics and integrating communication with teams. Keep power, governance, change and stakeholder trade-offs, because these are the points where students move from explaining behavior to making organizational decisions.

14-week course structure

Use the extra sessions to separate individual-difference topics, give conflict its own negotiation workshop, deepen the governance simulation debrief and create space for capstone presentations plus individual challenge.

The Corporate Governance Simulation turns a conflict-of-interest case into a live boardroom interaction. A successful CTO holds a financial interest in a competing company. CEO, CTO, CCO and Shareholder teams must use evidence about performance, compliance and market consequences to agree both an immediate response and safeguards for future conflicts.

Why it fits here

By Session 10 students already know power, conflict, culture, ethics, voice and organization design. The simulation therefore becomes a test of judgement rather than a first exposure to the concepts. The key OB question is whether a role can pursue its own legitimate interest while still contributing to a proportionate, governable collective decision.

What students do

• Review an assigned stakeholder role, mission, objectives and action points.
• Analyse the conflict using evidence including performance and leadership information, an internal compliance perspective and governance implications for investor confidence and access to capital.
• Build an evidence-based position on disclosure, restrictions, divestment, executive responsibilities and other safeguards.
• Negotiate in four-role groups comprising CEO, CTO, CCO and Shareholder teams.
• Agree both the resolution of the current conflict and governance guidelines for similar future cases.
• Review the final resolution, approvals and role-specific comparative results during Reflection.

Recommended course placement

• At the end of Session 10 after structure and governance teaching.
• Across Sessions 9-10 if culture, power and governance are taught as one integrated block.
• Before a governance memo or board paper so students can convert the negotiated event into academic analysis.

Knowledge students should have before the simulation

• Basic conflict-of-interest and ethical reasoning.
• Power, dependency and negotiation concepts.
• Organizational culture and employee voice.
• Decision rights, accountability and governance safeguards.

Delivery format

Suggested debrief questions

• Which stakeholder had formal authority, and which had practical leverage?
• What evidence changed your position during Analysis or Structuring?
• Did the group resolve only the immediate conflict or also improve the governance system?
• Where did role incentives improve scrutiny, and where did they obstruct collective judgement?
• Which part of the final package was proportionate, and which part would you revise?
• What can the platform evidence show, and what must still be assessed through individual justification?

The ESG Simulation is a 2-4 hour role-based stakeholder negotiation. Management, Investor, Regulator and Union teams respond to a shared company challenge, analyse role-specific evidence, model connected operating and financial choices, negotiate environmental and workforce terms, and agree an ESG Policy Statement while keeping the company financially viable.

Why it fits here

As a secondary capstone, the simulation makes several OB ideas collide in one decision: stakeholder power, motivation and reward, employee interests, conflict, negotiation, governance, collective approval and responsible organizational behavior. It works best after students have already discussed change and can ask how the agreement would actually be implemented.

What students do

• Prepare in Management, Investor, Regulator or Union stakeholder teams using tailored evidence and a common case context.
• Use the modelling area to test terms for production, ESG expenditure, additional investment, management compensation, wages and workforce size.
• Negotiate a connected package covering filter system, production level, ESG budget, investment, compensation, worker wages, workforce numbers and a shared ESG Policy Statement.
• Keep the final package financially viable, including the simulation requirement that EBITDA remains above $20 million.
• Secure approval from all four stakeholder teams, or review why agreement failed.
• Compare the final environmental, workforce and financial outcomes with other teams representing the same stakeholder role.

Recommended course placement

• In Session 12 as an integrative stakeholder capstone.
• Across two sessions if the lecturer wants more time for modelling, negotiation and debrief.
• Before a final individual memo asking what the organization should implement and why.

Knowledge students should have before the simulation

• Stakeholder interests and sources of power.
• Motivation, compensation and workforce consequences.
• Conflict and negotiation.
• Ethics, culture, governance and organizational change.

Delivery format

Suggested debrief questions

• Which stakeholder trade-off was hardest to make explicit?
• Did your role-specific success produce a credible collective outcome?
• Which term had the largest financial or workforce consequence?
• Where did power come from: formal authority, information, capital, regulation or the ability to withhold agreement?
• What would implementation require from leaders and employees after the negotiated package is approved?
• What part of the final outcome can be attributed to a team, and what evidence is still needed to assess individual learning?

The platform records what each team decided, the terms they agreed and comparative outcomes across groups. That evidence supports your academic judgement; it does not replace it, and it does not establish which individual student made which argument.

Grading with the Corporate Governance Simulation

The simulation asks CEO, CTO, CCO and Shareholder teams to analyse a conflict of interest, negotiate a shared resolution and establish future safeguards. It produces team-level evidence that can support a governance memo, debrief or oral defence.

• Use of case evidence rather than assertion.
• Quality and proportionality of the governance decision.
• Recognition of stakeholder responsibilities and conflicts.
• Strength of future safeguards, not only the immediate decision.
• Ability to explain trade-offs between executive continuity, compliance and investor confidence.
• Individual defence of one assumption, compromise or rejected alternative.

Grading with the ESG Simulation

The ESG Simulation asks Management, Investor, Regulator and Union teams to model and negotiate connected environmental, workforce and financial terms while maintaining viability. The final agreement, policy statement and comparative outcomes support assessment, but they do not automatically identify individual contribution.

• Evidence used to justify role priorities.
• Financial and operational consistency of proposed terms.
• Quality of stakeholder trade-off analysis.
• Negotiation discipline and ability to reach a viable collective package.
• Connection between the final terms and organizational behavior concepts such as motivation, power, culture and change.
• Individual reflection explaining what the student would defend, revise or implement next.

Moderation, individual evidence and free-riding

• Publish criteria before the activity and use the same rubric across groups.
• Moderate a sample of high, middle and low work where local policy requires it.
• Do not award individual marks solely from team scores or leaderboard position.
• Add a short individual viva, assumptions note or reflection so contribution and reasoning are attributable.
• Use peer contribution data cautiously and as supporting evidence, not as a substitute for academic judgement.
• If free-riding is a concern, require each student to answer one role-specific question or defend one decision from the group output.