This nine-month professional development program includes three four-day on-site sessions and a web-based follow-up session six months after graduation. The three four-day on-site sessions are as follows:

• September 28-October 1, 2009
• January 11-14, 2010
• April 6-9, 2010

In addition to the onsite professional development sessions, participants engage in monthly conference calls, support and mentor one another via listserv, and receive individualized support from faculty.

The curriculum is built around both theory and practical skills applied to the participants' improvement projects. Combined, this provides a profound understanding of “why” and a clear vision of “how” to create lasting and effective improvement.

Topic areas include:

• The Science of Improvement: W.E. Deming's System of Profound Knowledge
  
  
• Model for Improvement: Using proven techniques to direct and accelerate organizational transformation
  
  
• Scoping Improvement Efforts: Using effective chartering techniques to appropriately and efficiently scope projects and link them to the organization's business objectives
  
  
• Understanding Systems and Processes: Using flow diagrams and linkage of processes to better understand the system and key interactions
  
  
• Using Data for Improvement: Using both qualitative and quantitative data.  Methods for obtaining, organizing and displaying data. Statistical Process Control (SPC) for analyzing data (run charts, Pareto diagrams, frequency plots, and Shewhart control charts).
  
  
• Understanding Relationships: Using two-way tables, scatter plots, and planned experimentation
  
  
• Gathering Information: Using surveys, benchmarking, idea generation methods, forms for collecting data, and operational definitions
  
  
• Organizing Information: Using affinity, force field analyses, cause and effect diagrams, matrix diagrams, and tree diagrams
  
  
• Developing Powerful Ideas for Change: Developing changes that may lead to improvement using several methods including creative thinking
  
  
• Testing Changes: Determining the appropriate scale for a test of change and effectively planning tests of change
  
  
• Implementing Changes: When to move from testing to implementation and how to build proven changes into the fabric of the organization. Holding the gains and spreading changes.
  
  
• Decision Making: Understanding of prediction and judgment biases and decision traps
  
  
• Working with People: Using proven methods to better work with people, including organizing improvement teams and handling difficult conversations, and developing consultative skills
  
  
• Planned Experimentation: Design experiments aimed at testing the impact of multiple changes on process outcomes. Learn about the impact of each change and about the interaction of changes.