MS in Human Resources Courses

Core Courses

Organizational Behavior, Leadership, and Culture

Learn to apply behavioral sciences to management issues through integration of conceptual and experiential approaches. Topics include self-awareness, perception, communication, motivation, productivity, group behavior processes, leadership, organizational change, diversity, ethical issues, career planning, and the management of personal and organizational stress.

Total Rewards

Explore key issues and challenges compensation managers face as they strive to attract, motivate, retain, develop, and engage high-performance talent in today’s global economy. You will examine statutory and voluntary benefits, health and welfare benefits, ERISA, and elements of administration.

Financial Accounting

Study and discuss accounting principles and concepts that provide the foundation for the measurement and communication of financial data. Specific topics include valuation of resources, accounting for debt and equities, income determinants, and analysis of cash flow.

Leadership and Ethics

Learn the art of value clarification and responsible leadership within organizations and society at large. Experience and work through real-world scenarios and case studies, to isolate the ethical issues, both pro and con, and propose viable alternatives consistent with ethical and moral values.

Digital Platforms for Human Resources Processes and Information Management

Study how contemporary digital technologies support the various processes along the HR value chain and how these individual technologies must integrate into a coherent digital platform. Learn how to conceptualize information needed for the HR function and how to capture, analyze, and interpret data to satisfy those needs.

Fundamentals of the American Legal System and Employment Law

Consider and analyze employment law: Review modern case studies that showcase how rule of law in the U.S. works and how to apply that knowledge in day-to-day work as an HR leader.

Strategic Human Resources

Learn to formulate and execute a business-focused HR strategy that drives value for an organization; the course especially emphasizes implementing strategic plans in global environments. Gain practical tools and frameworks that will enable you to link HR strategy with business strategy—topics include the social, ethical, and legal environments of an organization, diversity in the workplace, organizational culture, and business strategy.

Responsible Business Practice Capstone

Examine multidisciplinary values such as environmental stewardship, corporate citizenship, product and service excellence, and financial strength. You will be required to integrate these four values in building a blueprint for business sustainability. The course is taught from a practitioner’s point of view and utilizes a combination of case studies, current media, and guest speakers. The capstone project requires you to work collaboratively in preparing a business plan that will be presented to a panel of distinguished business entrepreneurs.

Personal and Leadership Development Workshop

This workshop serves as an orientation toward the experiential and team-based models of learning used at Graziadio Business School. Students engage in exercises and reflection that are meant to enhance communication, ethical decision making, career development, and other relevant skills for interpersonal effectiveness in business.


New Courses

Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging (DEIB)

Explore the management of diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging at work and how the HR management function can contribute to leveraging diversity as a competitive advantage. Upon completion of this course, you will have the modern and necessary HR tools needed to implement effective DEIB practices within organizations.

The Business Case for Human Resources

This course will demonstrate the numerous ways that the human resources function can—and does—add value to businesses. You will learn the central difference between HR as an administrative function and HR as a strategic business function and how mastering the latter can help you add value to organizations.

Human Resources Capstone

To complete the capstone to the Master of Science in Human Resources Program, you will participate in a simulation meant to give you the opportunity to manage an HR department. You will apply what you have learned in the program to make decisions about managing and budgeting an HR department, set policy, and deal with situations that are part of the daily operations of the human resources function.

Human Resources Consulting and Change Management

Explore the realities of change management in the workforce, discover practical application of change management strategies, engage in theoretical discussions on the subject, and gain a clearer understanding of the consultancy process as it relates to human resources management.

Principles of Talent Management

Learn how to be a more strategic leader who understands the ins and outs of talent management. Upon completion, you will be prepared to nurture employees and their talents and recruit and retain talent that can become a vital component of any organization. 

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Elective Courses

Global Business Intensive

Hosted by partner schools abroad, Global Business Intensive focuses on critical aspects of doing business in the global economy. The course consists of lectures by distinguished faculty members of the partner schools and recognized experts from companies and research centers on a variety of contemporary business issues. The course involves a series of seminars covering such topics as international economics, culture, marketing, finance, and political and legal contexts. Some programs also include field visits to internationally recognized companies or organizations in the region for a hands-on look at business opportunities and management strategies. Also included is a study tour of important historical sites. The tour provides an important backdrop of culture and history that flavors the nation’s current reality.

Business Negotiation and the Resolution of Conflict

Survey the dynamics of conflict, including techniques for its avoidance as well as alternative avenues of resolution should it occur. Learn useful mediation, negotiation, and conflict-avoidance techniques, and apply what you learn during practical exercises.

Advanced Principles of Organizations and Leadership

Examine the interaction among human resources, technologies, organization design, external forces, and management practices from a macro-organization perspective. Focus on organizations as systems and managerial, technical, structural, and cultural subsystems as they relate to the broader environment. Explore the concepts of system design, work design, and management theory.

Cross-Cultural Management

Explore cultural influences on organizations and on the people working within them. Emphasis is placed on learning how to “learn culture” using methods for scanning the cultural assumptions of groups; bringing personally held cultural assumptions to consciousness; gaining exposure to the cultures of a variety of different regions, nations, and groups and considering their organizational and managerial implications; and facilitating communication and cooperation across cultures. Personal and managerial skills are developed to enhance performance in multicultural environments and on transpatriate assignments.

Managerial Creativity and Innovation for Leadership

Delve into creative imagination and invention, and the productive and innovative results of such processes. Hone your problem-solving and leadership skills by integrating a dozen linear methods with a dozen nonlinear, imaginative tools.

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Ready to Apply?

Learn more about the online MS in Human Resources program from Pepperdine University today.