Skip directly to: Navigation for this section | Main page content

Custom Executive Academy

UC Davis Extension's Executive Academy provides an opportunity for senior leaders in your organization to explore the depths of their personal strengths and talents. The world in which we live is becoming increasingly complex, and constant change challenges our ability to remain focused, determined and vigorous. Becoming a better leader is the only option for continued success.

This innovative customized program will help your executives expand their sense of leadership, allow them to go beyond what they thought possible, better understand the challenges they face, and prepare for the opportunities ahead. Incorporating a variety of teaching methodologies—mini-lectures, individual and small-group work/discussions, and exercises—we will work with you to develop a comprehensive program to fit your needs and your budget.

Sample Custom Executive Academy

Each class in the series is led by an instructor with specific and practical expertise in the topic area. Courses will take place during regular business hours, typically from 9 a.m.-4 p.m. at your place of business, the Sutter Square Galleria at 2901 K St. in Sacramento, or a place of your choosing. Your program may include the following sessions:

  • Now, Discover Your Strengths and Leadership Styles
  • Mental Models
  • Leadership Communication
  • Good to Great in Leadership
  • Difficult Conversations
  • Power and Influence
  • Leading Complex Organizations

Sample seminar topics

Now, Discover Your Strengths and Leadership Styles
9.5 hours of instruction over the course of 1.5 days

Participants will discover strengths they may not yet be aware of and learn to apply them to enhance their ability to lead, coach and mentor others. Based on the popular book Now, Discover Your Strengths, this session focuses on developing unique talents and improving performance levels.

Mental Models
6 hours of instruction over the course of 1 day

Students will examine in depth how people construct worldviews, paradigms and mental models. They will begin by exploring their own perspectives in order to understand how they make sense of the world around them. From there, they will look at how others see and respond to that world, and how organizations develop a common view of what is important, what is critical and what is vital to its well being.

Leadership Communication
6 hours of instruction over the course of 1 day

Participants will examine some of the subtle, yet critically important, linguistic differences between how people use language in a variety of ways, and how these differences can often unconsciously shape outcomes—positively and negatively.

Good to Great in Leadership
6 hours of instruction over the course of 1 day

Students will explore the concepts from Jim Collins' classic work Good to Great. They will then assess their own teams and consider how to move beyond being good to being great. Topics examined include the key concepts and pitfalls associated with organizational change; hiring and retention practices; what to do and what to stop doing; disciplined people, actions and thoughts; preserving core values; and stimulating on-going progress.

Difficult Conversations
9 hours of instruction over the course of 1.5 days

Participants will examine a well-tested strategy to engage in difficult conversations successfully, so that both parties end the conversation feeling better each other, themselves and the situation. Any conversation we avoid having at work, because we are concerned things will get worse, is a "difficult" conversation.

Power and Influence
9 hours of instruction over the course of 1.5 days

Students will examine the issue of power: what it is, whether it is good or bad, who has it, how does a person acquire it, and how it can be lost. They will then look at eight different types of power and discuss how each type can be increased or lost, and in which situations each type may be most effective. They will also consider the relationship between influence and power, including exploring strategies to gain influence.

Leading Complex Organizations
6 hours of instruction over the course of 1 day

Students will explore new ways of thinking about leadership that will help them avoid the intellectual trap of personality, power and politics. They will also learn how to see their organizations as complex adaptive systems and to focus on their own leverage as a leader to achieve strategic objectives.

Additional sample seminar topics

  • Discover the Leader Within
  • Dynamic Teams
  • Exploring Emotional Intelligence in Leadership
  • Four Generations at Work
  • Influencing People
  • The Know-Doing Gap
  • Strategic Thinking and Results
  • Thinking like a Leader and Influencing Your Organizational Culture

Learn More

Please contact our associate director of Corporate Education, Kathy Canevari, at (530) 757-8895 or email for information about developing a program specifically designed for your organization.