14 November 2007
Presented as a breakthrough for executives and managers with disabilities, UCLA Anderson School of Management is launching its Leadership Institute for Managers with Disabilities on November 12-16, 2007. The five-day program, offered through the school’s Office of Executive Education, will examine promotion and career advancement issues affecting these professionals, while addressing relevant leadership, and community specific topics, as well.
“This program will move the goal posts of the current employer/activist debate away from recruitment, hiring and retention of people with disabilities,” said Laurie Dowling, faculty co-director of the Institute. “Instead, the dialogue will be about how to self-facilitate one’s promotion as an executive with disabilities up the corporate career ramp.”
Developed with leading thinkers well-versed on the experiences of persons with disabilities in the workplace, the Institute will help participants maximize their personal, professional, and organizational potential through enhanced teamwork and leadership skills. Participants will learn to think, lead, and manage in ways that celebrate their individual attributes and perspectives, while also boosting their position within their organization.
“We must have ‘out and proud’ disabled executives willing to distinguish themselves as role models,” said John D. Kemp, executive director and general counsel to the US Business Leadership Network, a founding organization of the Institute. “This program offers an opportunity to nurture our culture of disability and protect and enhance the identity of people with disabilities at all levels of a corporation.”
The Institute represents a logical and timely addition to UCLA Anderson’s renowned Leadership Suite series which offer programs for African American, Latino, women, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender managers. The programs are designed to help participants maximize their personal, professional, and organizational potential, while holding fast to the principle that building a truly diverse workforce will have a positive impact on the bottom-line of any organization.
Founding organizations of the Institute include AIG, AOL, AT&T, DiversityInc, Fannie Mae, Google, IBM, Merck, Microsoft Corporation, Motorola, Office of Disability Employment Policy, PepsiCo, Society for Human Resource Management, Union Bank of California, and the U.S. Business Leadership Network. The Institute has been funded in part with federal funds from the U.S. Department of Labor, Office of Disability Employment Policy.
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