Skip to Main Content
HBS Home
  • About
  • Academic Programs
  • Alumni
  • Faculty & Research
  • Baker Library
  • Giving
  • Harvard Business Review
  • Initiatives
  • News
  • Recruit
  • Map / Directions
Executive Education
  • Apply / Log-in
  • Program Finder
  • Blog
  • Subscribe
  • Health & Safety
  • FAQs
Executive Education
Programs for IndividualsPrograms for OrganizationsHBS ExperienceFacultyAdmissionsParticipant Stories
  • Programs for Individuals
    Dropdown
    • Comprehensive Leadership Programs
    • Topic-Focused Programs
    • Regional Programs
    • Virtual Programs
    • Certificate of Management Excellence
    • Corporate Director Certificate
    • Digital Transformation Certificate
  • Programs for Organizations
  • HBS Experience
    Dropdown
    • The Value
    • The Learning Experience
    • The Virtual Experience
    • Alumni Network
    • Admitted? Plan Your Stay
    • Insights
  • Faculty
  • Admissions
    Dropdown
    • Admissions Requirements
    • Admissions Process
    • International Applicants
    • Payment, Cancellation, and Deferral
    • Already Admitted
  • Participant Stories
Executive Education
Harvard Business School Right arrow Executive Education Right arrow Participant Stories Right arrow Rethinking Leadership
... Right arrow Harvard Business School Right arrow Executive Education Right arrow Participant Stories Right arrow Rethinking Leadership

Rethinking Leadership

Step outside your comfort zone to empower teams, solve problems, and advance business goals.
Rethinking Leadership
Step outside your comfort zone to empower teams, solve problems, and advance business goals.
Featured Program
Program for Leadership Development: Accelerating the Careers of Hig...
Status

Accepting Applications

Date

10 JUL 2023-26 JAN 2024

Format

Blended Combines both in-person and virtual learning.

Location

Virtual, HBS Campus

Stay on the leadership fast-track by expanding your business acumen and ability to lead.
Download Download Brochure
Need Help? Contact Us:
Ms. Christine Packer
Senior Program Advisor
Email: cpacker@hbs.edu
Program Finder
Featured Program
Program for Leadership Development: Accelerating the Careers of Hig...
Status

Accepting Applications

Date

10 JUL 2023-26 JAN 2024

Format

Blended Combines both in-person and virtual learning.

Location

Virtual, HBS Campus

Stay on the leadership fast-track by expanding your business acumen and ability to lead.
Download Download Brochure
Program Finder

As Peter Waters, clinical chief of Boston Children's Hospital's orthopedic surgery department, assumed more organizational leadership responsibility, he found he needed skills not typically taught in medical school. At the Program for Leadership Development (PLD), he discovered new ways to empower teams, solve problems, and advance the hospital's goals.

How can PLD help medical industry professionals advance in their careers?

To become a clinician or surgeon, you undergo years of training and become highly skilled. You also innovate, finding new treatments, tools, or ways to operate, and you grow soft skills in how to work with patients, families, and colleagues. But when you start to take on leadership roles in a hospital, you need different skills and knowledge that are completely outside the medical domain. PLD provides this leadership foundation.

How did PLD help you build new skills?

PLD offers a safe, supportive learning environment, but it takes you outside your standard silo, where you've been effective and where you are comfortable. Doctors and scientists tend to think there's a right answer for everything and that numbers have to be very precise. When we started the finance exercises, I obsessed about getting to the right number. Once in class, however, I'd realize that much of it was back-of-the-napkin math, and then I would really begin to understand the concepts. This learning process was typical of many of the program topics. I'd go in with some baseline expectations, not realizing how much I didn't know, and then I would learn the method and how to be quite precise in my use of it.

How are you approaching your role as a leader differently now?

After PLD, the core of my leadership style is still the same, but a lot is different around the edges. For example, I orchestrate meetings differently, ask questions in a different manner, and solicit opinions more. I am more patient, and I now know when to follow someone else's lead.

In addition, PLD gave me a greater understanding of how to empower teams and how put together a team that will cooperate well. As a leader, you must have a vision of where you are going, but you also must be able to enable people to come up with a better result than you would have found on your own.

How does a shared PLD experience benefit an organization?

Most of us have become very skilled at thinking and solving problems on our own, but business challenges are often best addressed as a team. Sending multiple people to PLD has a snowball effect. When colleagues have been to PLD, you can engage in a very dynamic way and produce a better result. For example, when I serve on committees with others who have also attended PLD, that common bond and common language are very helpful.

After PLD, you enrolled in other HBS Executive Education programs. What brought you back?

I wanted to keep fertilizing my brain and reinforcing new habits of thinking and acting. People at HBS have recommended specific programs. Along the way, I was able to earn HBS alumni status, which provides other resources for continuing my business education.

Featured Program
Program for Leadership Development: Accelerating the Careers of Hig...
Status

Accepting Applications

Date

10 JUL 2023-26 JAN 2024

Format

Blended Combines both in-person and virtual learning.

Location

Virtual, HBS Campus

Stay on the leadership fast-track by expanding your business acumen and ability to lead.
Download Download Brochure
Need Help? Contact Us:
Ms. Christine Packer
Senior Program Advisor
Email: cpacker@hbs.edu
Program Finder
Featured Program
Program for Leadership Development: Accelerating the Careers of Hig...
Status

Accepting Applications

Date

10 JUL 2023-26 JAN 2024

Format

Blended Combines both in-person and virtual learning.

Location

Virtual, HBS Campus

Stay on the leadership fast-track by expanding your business acumen and ability to lead.
Download Download Brochure
Program Finder

View Frequently Asked Questions

Subscribe to Our Emails

Back to Top Arrow up

ǁ
Campus Map
Executive Education
Harvard Business School
Soldiers Field
Boston, MA 02163
Contact Us
→Virtual Tour
→Map & Directions
→More Contact Information
  • Make a Gift
  • Site Map
  • Jobs
  • Harvard University
  • Trademarks
  • Policies
  • Accessibility
  • Digital Accessibility
Copyright © President & Fellows of Harvard College