Neal Hartman

On December 3, the Digital October Center held a teleconference with Neal Hartman, professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management and leading teacher of the communicative theory of management.

Presentation

He has been giving lectures and seminars for 18 years already regarding cross-cultural communication, leadership, and conflict resolution for MBA students, so materials from some of his lessons have been selected to be published in OpenCourseWare, MIT’s open educational portal.

Looking at the phenomenon of entrepreneurship as widely as possible, that is, speaking not only about start-ups, but also about social entrepreneurship, different areas in business, potential scenarios in non-profit and even government organizations, Hartman teaches how to set up relationships in a professional arena that is made up of representatives of different macro- and micro-cultures. In addition, he also includes which peculiarities of a local cultural code are worth taking into consideration when working in a new market.

During the lecture Neal described the basic techniques for cross-cultural communication, discussing:

• how the norms, values, and lifestyle accepted in a community impact a person’s belief in their own abilities
• which cultures encourage creativity and, as a result, entrepreneurship
• where developing one’s self is looked at as a step backward in a career, bringing on depression, and what the social effect of that is
• other things that future leaders should know in the era of globalization and migrating qualified personnel.

Participation was free of charge, thanks to Rostelecom, general partner of our Knowledge Stream project, and RVC, intellectual partner of this lecture. 

Facts about the lecturer:

* Neal has been invited to speak to students at Tsinghua, Fudan, and Zhongshan (Lingnan College) universities, which are leaders in China.

* He was also one of the primary facilitators for CMI-Enterprises, a program run jointly by Cambridge University and MIT that helped people at leading universities in Northern America and Europe uncover and develop entrepreneurial talents.

* Hartman holds a BA in music theory and composition, an MS in higher education administration, and an ABD in organizational communication.