Strategic Partnership

PRESS RELEASE

For Immediate Release: September 23, 2004
For More Information: Becky Collins, 215-898-6967, [email protected]

Center for Organizational Dynamics and the Ackoff Center for the Advancement of Systems Approaches (ACASA) Form Strategic Partnership

September 23, 2004 (Philadelphia, PA) – The Center for Organizational Dynamics located in the School of Arts and Sciences (SAS) and the Ackoff Center for the Advancement of Systems Approaches (ACASA) located in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) both at the University of Pennsylvania announce a strategic partnership that will take effect September 23, 2004. The partnership will facilitate scholarship and delivery of non-degree educational workshops on systems thinking in management. The partnership will also broaden the courses available for students enrolled in the Master of Science in Engineering (MSE) and Master of Science in Organizational Dynamics (MSOD) degree programs.

“This partnership will focus on delivery of systems thinking research, models, and methods to organizations in the Delaware Valley and across the globe. We are very pleased not only about the relationship with ACASA, but with the continued relationship with Dr. Russell Ackoff for whom ACASA was named and who recently taught in our MSOD program” reported Dr. Larry Starr, Executive Director of the Center for Organizational Dynamics and Director of the Organizational Dynamics Graduate Program.

Dr. Barry Silverman, Director of ACASA and Professor of Engineering and Medicine and Operations and Information Management noted, “This is an excellent combination of resources. Workshops and seminars involving systems thinking, technology, and organizational dynamics will be enhanced by our combined faculties. Furthermore, engineering students will have access to the more than 70 organizational courses in the MSOD program.”

ACASA and the Center for Organizational Dynamics recently combined efforts to help manage the 3rd International Conference on Systems Thinking in Management (ICSTM) held at the University of Pennsylvania May 19-21, 2004.

The mission of the Center for Organizational Dynamics is to support the Organizational Dynamics Degree Program and to increase the effectiveness of leaders and managers by developing and supporting a person-oriented, multi-disciplinary understanding of organizations.

The mission of ACASA is to conduct theoretical and applied research, education and service to industry, government and education, using system sciences and systems thinking as global knowledge and competency resources.

The partnership’s day-to-day activities will be managed jointly by John Pourdehnad, PhD, Associate Director of ACASA and Marie Zecca, EdM, Associate Director of the Center for Organizational Dynamics.