Special Topics in OBHRM — From Human Nature to Future Tech: Tools for Tomorrow's Leaders

Technological revolutions, from artificial intelligence and robotics to ubiquitous automation and mass surveillance, are rapidly reshaping how people live, work, and relate to one another. Yet these transformations do not unfold in a vacuum. Their real impact depends on the enduring features of human nature: our motives, emotions, moral intuitions, biases, social dynamics, and cultural norms.

This course examines how these psychological foundations influence whether emerging technologies are embraced, resisted, moralized, misused, co-opted, or redesigned. Rather than treating technology as an external force acting on society, we approach it as something filtered through the minds and behaviours of human beings. Drawing on insights from psychology, behavioural economics, evolutionary theory, sociology, and moral philosophy, we will explore how individuals and groups understand technological change, how they adapt — or fail to adapt — to it, and how you, as a leader, can anticipate and shape these responses.

Through cases, debates, experiential exercises, and interdisciplinary readings, you will develop tools to analyze human behaviour in the context of technological disruption and to lead others through periods of uncertainty and change. By the end, you will gain a deeper understanding of the psychological and social forces that govern human–technology interaction and a more informed perspective on how to navigate and influence the future of work, society, and innovation.