CII Executive Leadership Program (XLP)
This challenging program will be taught by highly respected construction industry practitioners and by McCombs School of Business faculty. McCombs faculty are renowned scholars, outstanding educators, and groundbreaking researchers who remain involved with practice through relationships with business and industry leaders, and by participating as board members and consultants for top companies around the world. Teaching is accomplished through lectures, discussions, and extensive small group interaction and problem solving.
This page is under development. Although these presenters taught the 2024 program, some individual instructors may not repeat in 2025. This information is tentative.
John A. Daly, The University of Texas at Austin
John Daly is the Liddell Professor of Communication, TCB Professor of Management, and an adjunct Professor in the College of Pharmacy. He teaches graduate and undergraduate courses on advocacy and influence, interpersonal communication and organizational behavior. While at UT, he has won every major award given on campus for undergraduate teaching.
Dr. Daly has been the President of the National Communication Association, Chair of the Council of Communication Associations, and served on the Board of Directors of both the International Customer Service Association and the International Communication Association. He has been the editor of two academic journals and served on the editorial boards of numerous journals, and is one of less than 50 scholars in the world who is a Fellow of the International Communication Association. Fellows are recognized for their major scholarly contributions. His work appeared in any number of popular outlets including the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post and the New York Times.
On management and communication-related topics (e.g., advocacy and influence, leadership, teamwork, sales, customer loyalty), Dr. Daly has worked with numerous firms such as JP MorganChase, Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, Roche, Amgen, Merck, Pfizer, Bayer, Astra-Zeneca, State Farm, Prudential, Essilor, Union Pacific, LG, Kraft, Apple, HP, IBM, BP-AMOCO, PetroChina, CNOOC, Shell, ExxonMobil, Halliburton, AGIP, AT&T, Home Depot, Texas Instruments, UPS, McCarthy, Zachry, American Airlines, Continental Airlines, 3M, Novell, Frito-Lay, Dell, and Samsung, among many others.
In the governmental arena, Dr. Daly has worked with the White House (Executive Office of the President) designing and implementing a major customer service initiative as well as with numerous Federal, State, and local government units throughout the United States.
Professor Daly has published more than 100 research articles and chapters in scholarly periodicals and produced eight books including the Handbook of Interpersonal Communication and Advocacy: Championing Innovation and Influencing Others.
Doug Dierking, The University of Texas at Austin
Doug Dierking is a Senior Lecturer and the Assistant Department Chair in the Management Department at the McCombs School of Business, The University of Texas at Austin. He teaches graduate courses in sustainable leadership, leading people and organizations, creating and managing human capital and the art and science of negotiation. At the undergraduate level, he teaches courses in the art and science of negotiation, consulting, and change management and organizational behavior. He has been teaching at the university for over 12 years. Dr. Dierking’s research interests include organizational culture, effective employee on-boarding and retention practices, leadership development and succession planning.
Professor Dierking’s excellence in teaching has been recognized numerous times, most recently on the McCombs School of Business Graduate Business Council Faculty Honor Roll – 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009, 2008, and 2007; Texas Evening MBA Outstanding Professor Award – 2010 and Texas Evening MBA Faculty Honor Roll – 2012, 2011, 2010, 2007 & 2005; Texas Exes Teaching Award – 2005; Lockheed Martin Excellence in Teaching Award – 2005; and Hank and Mary Harkins Foundation Award for Effective Teaching – 2005.
In addition to teaching at The University of Texas, Dr. Dierking is very active in the corporate and public sectors. He has worked extensively with Royal Dutch Shell internationally to develop and deliver training in leading project teams, particularly geographically dispersed or virtual teams for project engineers. He has provided training and consulting in the areas of leadership, recruiting, on-boarding and retaining high performance talent, executive coaching and change management to a wide variety of companies such as Ecopetrol, Sinopec, Petrobras, Polycom, BBVA, Gulf States Toyota, Texas Instruments, Dell, Motorola and Emerson Electric (Fisher-Rosemount), as well as numerous smaller organizations.
Dr. Dierking currently serves on the Advisory Board of Directors of a large non-profit organization (Past-President) and has served on several community boards.
Karen Landolt, The University of Texas at Austin
Karen M. Landolt has been teaching, coaching, and leading in nonprofit, legal, and academic settings for 25 years. As an Assistant Professor of Instruction in the McCombs School of Business, Professor Landolt teaches Business Law, Behavioral Ethics, Entrepreneurship, Intellectual Property Law, and Negotiations. Equally fascinated with pop culture and coaching others to lead with their strengths, she finds creative ways to integrate service, experiential learning, and pop culture into her teaching. Landolt previously practiced intellectual property law at Testa, Hurwitz & Thibeault, LLP, a large venture capital/intellectual property firm, and was a founding partner of Tremont Law Group, LLP, a boutique business and intellectual property firm. Landolt was admitted to the Massachusetts bar in 2001 and is a Certified Mediator. She served as Director of two UT Austin career services offices and is a founding partner of Engage Leadership Consulting, LLC, which focuses on team building for corporations, start-ups, and nonprofits.
Art Markman, The University of Texas at Austin
Dr. Art Markman is the Annabel Irion Worsham Centennial Professor of Psychology, HDO, and Marketing, and Executive Director of the IC2 Institute. He has written over 150 papers on topics including reasoning, decision making, and motivation.
Dr. Markman brings insights from cognitive science to a broader audience through his blogs at Psychology Today and Fast Company as well as his radio show/podcast “Two Guys on Your Head.” Art is the author of several books including Smart Thinking, Smart Change, Brain Briefs, and Bring Your Brain to Work.
Melissa Murphy, The University of Texas at Austin
Melissa Murphy is an award-winning teacher and scholar at The University of Texas at Austin and is the founder and chief communication coach of The Pitch Academy. Professor Murphy currently teaches business communication, negotiation, and entrepreneurship courses for undergraduate and graduate students at Texas McCombs School of Business. She has taught professional communication skills, nonverbal communication, and organizational communication for the Moody College of Communication and has also held academic teaching positions in the Master of Science in Technology Commercialization program since 2012. She also teaches numerous workshops for Texas Executive Education.
James A. Nolen, The University of Texas at Austin
Jim Nolen holds the title of Distinguished Senior Lecturer in the Department of Finance of the McCombs School of Business at The University of Texas at Austin. He joined the department in 1980 where he currently teaches graduate classes in corporate finance and entrepreneurship. Professor Nolen’s research interests are in the area of business valuation, mergers and acquisition, private equity and venture capital. Mr. Nolen is the faculty advisor for the Venture Fellows and Entrepreneurs Society. In addition to his teaching in UT’s MBA and Executive MBA programs, Professor Nolen has also taught at IMEDEC University in Vienna, Monterrey Tech in Mexico City and Finland’s TURKU School of Economics and ESADE.
Jim Nolen is the two-time recipient of the Fawn and Vijay Mahajan Award in Executive Education. He has also been awarded the Mary and Hank Harkin Award for Effective Teaching. Professor Nolen has made the Faculty Honor Roll every semester since its inception in 1999. Mr. Nolen has also been selected for a teaching award from the Graduate Business Council at graduation every year since 1999, including the Best Ability to Link Theory and Practice.
Professor Nolen has designed and taught in both public and custom programs in Executive Education including: Texas Instruments, Dell, Essilor, St. Jude Medical, Polycom, BMC Software, M.D. Anderson, Motorola, Shell Oil, PetSmart, Vought Aircraft, State Farm Insurance, H. B. Zachry, CII, USAA, and FedEx-Kinkos among others. Mr. Nolen is also President of CFO Services, Inc., a middle-market business consulting firm specializing in business valuations as well as merger and acquisition advisory services. He also serves on the boards of directors of an independent bank, a medical distribution company, a recycling firm and the McCombs MBA Alumni Association.
Gaylen D. Paulson, The University of Texas at Austin
Dr. Gaylen Paulson is Associate Dean and Director for Texas Executive Education at the McCombs School of Business at The University of Texas at Austin. He is also a Senior Lecturer for the Management Department. His research and teaching are focused on the strategic aspects of interacting with people, including negotiation, conflict management, persuasion, and interpersonal communication.The recipient of numerous teaching awards, Dr. Paulson was most recently named to the “Faculty Honor Roll” by the UT MBA students and “Outstanding Faculty” by the Engineering Management Executive Master’s program. He also received the 2007 Fawn and Vijay Mahajan Teaching Excellence Award in Executive Education.
Dr. Paulson’s consulting and executive training programs have been sponsored by a wide variety of organizations such as 3M, Aegon, Bayer, British Petroleum, The Conference Board, Dell, Ernst & Young, Genesis10, Guidant, Harcourt Publishing, HEB, Johnson & Johnson, KLA-Tencor, LG Electronics, The Merchants Consortium, Microsoft, PMI, the National Council of State Housing Agencies, NAVSEA, NPR, Ortho-McNeil, Pfizer, Shell, Standard Aero, the Southwest Women’s Business Council, Texas Instruments, the Texas Nurses Association, the U.S. Army and VHA Inc. Dr. Paulson presents frequently in programs focusing on negotiation skills, managerial leadership and strategic influence.
Don Ruse, The University of Texas at Austin
Don Ruse is a seasoned executive with an extensive track record of helping C-level executives and global organizations develop and implement strategies that enable scale and drive profitable growth. Professor Ruse has served as a trusted adviser to over 55 organizations, partnering with them to successfully address new growth opportunities, cost and profitability pressures, and large-scale business transformation challenges. He has deep expertise in strategy, organization design, business process improvement, organization governance, and culture transformation. He has served clients across a broad range of industries with considerable experience working with leaders of innovation-based organizations in technology, materials science, and life sciences.Don’s global experience is extensive, having spent considerable time working in Asia, EMEA, and North America. Don is the Founder and Managing Partner of Bryant Park Partners LLC. Bryant Park Partners is a management advisory firm that specializes in helping companies scale and profitably grow by intentionally designing their organizations to execute strategy. Prior to Bryant Park Partners, Don was a Partner at Axiom Consulting Partners and a Managing Partner at Sibson Consulting. Before moving to professional services, Don spent 12 years as a practitioner and manager working for Honeywell, Mobil Oil, The Quaker Oats Company, and Lennox International.