This article discusses the benefits of using "Mafia"--a fun, interactive, low-cost, and easy-to-learn role-playing game--to explore organizational behavior (OB) topics. We explain how "Mafia" can be used in the classroom to discuss OB topics, including dynamics of teamwork, disagreement and conflict, decision-making, trust,…

Work motivation is a core component of many management courses. However, its effective teaching can be hampered by the fragmentation and seeming incoherence of the various theories of work motivation. To address this challenge, we describe an interactive role-play activity that induces students to synthesize, apply, and compare several theories of…

This experiential exercise uses feedback from peers to develop students' classroom contributions and build a classroom climate that encourages active engaging and learning. It is best suited for courses that require active classroom participation, but works well in any format, traditional and online, and with any level of students. The activity…

Situational leadership is a popular management training tool, yet scholars criticize the model's limitations and conflicted empirical support. Management educators are left with a lack of clarity on how to present situational leadership, and this article seeks to address the gap in teaching practice. The experiential role-play activity presented,…

In-class debates are an effective teaching method to cover contentious subjects. This article presents an experiential exercise in which students participate in debates pertaining to the inherent conflict between businesses' profit motive and the broader interests of society. Included in this article are classroom instructions for the exercise and…

Individuals who are privileged are often unaware of the unearned advantages that they have. Because of this lack of awareness, individuals with privilege may attribute poor performance of a non-privileged individual to that individual's lack of effort or ability, rather than recognizing that the non-privileged person may not have had sufficient…

Workforce variables routinely place top-of-mind for corporate decision makers in choosing where to locate. This article presents an experiential exercise in which students simulate human resource consultants in a site selection exercise. Suitable for face-to-face or online classes, students work individually, pitching their chosen state to other…

Sustainable development is a powerful, significant, and occasionally controversial topic in management education. It usually refers to "development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs." The broad view of sustainable development is articulated on the United…

$50K @ Play Day is an in-class activity in which student groups apply their knowledge of organizational justice in a managerial decision-making scenario. In this simulation, student teams assume the leadership role of a successful corporate team and are tasked with distributing a monetary team award in a just manner. A comparison of student…

This article reviews stock-trading simulations as a resource for use in management courses. Stock-trading simulations have three highly desirable qualities for educators: (1) they cost nothing to use--instructors can choose from various free simulators that all have the same general functionality, (2) they provide real and continuously updating…

Delivering bad news is an inevitable aspect of management. Teaching students to deliver bad news effectively and professionally can be successfully implemented into a course that addresses elements of managerial communication. In this article, we explain an experiential exercise that applies components of a three-phase model for delivering bad…

Despite the many theories supporting experiential learning, there is little guidance on how to design effective experiential exercises. To address this gap, we adapt insights from gamification research to devise a step-by-step process that management instructors may use to design effective experiential exercises for use in face-to-face and virtual…

This article presents an exercise designed to instill growth mindsets in business students and to demonstrate their effects on achievement motivation. The main points of the exercise are to introduce implicit theories of intelligence (i.e., fixed and growth mindsets), demonstrate that mindsets are malleable, apply growth mindset strategies, and…

In an ever-increasingly diverse workforce, cross-cultural communication skills are essential for success regardless of job title or task. We present an engaging and customizable 30-minute activity designed to develop participants' cross-cultural communication skills by increasing awareness and sensitivity to interpersonal differences in…

This article describes a game show-style classroom exercise that is appropriate for any management-related courses that wish to enrich students' understanding of a key phase of the hiring process. The activity introduces the importance of job descriptions and job specifications through a semiscripted unstructured interview patterned after a…