Let’s take this a step further and understand in detail. The Masters in Organizational Leadership prepares you to assume roles as dynamic leaders by blending business, communication, and social sciences to develop the necessary knowledge and skills to address an organization’s challenges. You will learn to align others around a shared vision, build and manage effective teams, and apply the leadership skills necessary to excel in an increasingly fast-paced and complex work world.

You will acquire professional competency by acquiring knowledge about leadership theories, contemporary leadership challenges, best practices, and industry standards relating to leadership. You will be able to articulate an ethical personal leadership philosophy for a diverse and multicultural workforce. You will also be able to develop the ability to provide vision and mission articulation, problem identification and definition, strategic planning, and ongoing evaluation.

Further, you will be able to integrate skills in multiple types of analyses by applying data analysis to organizational situations and challenges.

Online Masters in Organizational Leadership Degree Types

You would have gauged the impact that a professional in Organizational Leadership can have on an organization by now. An Organizational Leadership professional has multiple roles to play and based on your choice, and you can specialize in the type of degree of Organizational Leadership. We outline some of the most popular degree types in Online Masters in Organizational Leadership programs.

MBA Organizational Leadership Vs. MS Organizational Leadership

While both MS and MBA in Organizational Leadership programs can advance career significantly, students choose between the two programs based on the below factors:

• Previous qualification
• Work Experience
• Work experience
• The kind of career prospects that students want to pursue completing Masters’s in Organizational Leadership.

There are other differences between MBA vs. MOL degrees. MBA degrees focus on all aspects of businesses like finance, marketing, sales, etc., whereas MOL focuses on Organizational leadership concerning organization structure, the chain of command, and human resources.

Specializations in Masters in Organizational Leadership Programs

A Master’s in Organizational Leadership allows a specialization by completing a minimum number of concentration courses or electives. Based on our research, the available concentrations are as tabulated below:

Masters in Organizational Development	Students can observe how attitudes and beliefs affect decision making in organizations. Creating a productive and creative environment in the workplace helps employees understand their influence in shaping a company’s profile.
Masters in Organizational Management	Students learn to enact meaningful changes in today’s workplaces. The Master’s curriculum is designed to build on the foundational knowledge and skills of undergraduate studies while also introducing more advanced theories and modern business approaches. Traditional, hierarchical structures in Organizations have been challenged with the advent of new business models. Collaborative teams are the order of the day and Organizational Management, therefore, gains so much eminence in modern organizations. Candidates with Master’s in Organizational Management are in demand in line with the requirements of such organizations.
Masters in Executive Leadership	This degree provides contemporary real-world experience and helps discover applicable insights from various sectors. It’s a perfect fit for executives and senior-level employees looking to master soft skills, enhance their executive leadership skills, and broaden their capacity to engage and inspire others while staying anchored to their values. It’s also useful for public sector officials whose job function requires them to lead transformation across sectors. The program can be highly beneficial for those looking to build careers in nonprofit organizations with various challenges. Nonprofit leadership requires creativity to raise funds, build partnerships, and engage a diverse community of donors, volunteers, and board members.
Masters in Transformational Leadership	The Master of Arts in Transformational Leadership degree combines leadership theory and practice, peacebuilding, ethics, and spirituality to empower students as leaders for an equitable workplace. Students are prepared to lead through self-awareness and reflection, as they learn ways of bringing groups to new social consciousness, global understanding, and personal interconnectedness.

Curriculum and Skills Gained in Masters in Organizational Leadership Programs

Organizational leadership courses focus on setting strategic goals for an organization while also developing employees to meet their own goals.

Often, organizational leadership is perceived as a skill set within business management. Still, it is essential in virtually all organizations, and professionals in any field can use these skills to become more effective in their roles. Having a strong background in organizational leadership can even help advance your career.

As a master’s in leadership candidate, you’ll acquire the essential skills and mindsets of organizational leadership, including the following skills:

• Problem-solving
• Decision-making
• Communicating and listening effectively
• Learning from a diversity of perspectives
• Relationship and team building
• Developing leadership potential in others
• Identifying future innovations and opportunities
• Understanding your business environment
• Conducting business with integrity and ethics
• Thinking strategically and spreading the organization’s vision.

Let’s get into the details of the best online Leadership courses that build these vital skills in the students’ undertaking as a part of the coursework.

Human Behavior in Organizations	Look at theories of motivation, communication, leadership, power, and change relative to contemporary issues. Identify organizational issues, conduct a root cause analysis from a human behavior perspective, and determine targeted solutions that create positive, sustainable change.
Strategic Human Resource Management	Examine HR functions and state and federal regulatory requirements. Analyze the HR manager’s strategic role in recruitment, hiring, training, career development, and more.
Leading Change	Discover the various techniques and strategies used to effect systematic change and transform organizations. Coursework integrates Kotter’s processes for leading change, organizational development, and transformation theory and practice.
Organizational Leadership	Learn traditional and contemporary leadership theories and apply them to the analysis of the behavior of business managers, entrepreneurs, and other recognized individuals. The course includes readings, cases, exercises, and numerous examples of effective leadership models.
Responsible Corporate Leadership	Investigate the nature of the environments in which enterprises conduct their operations to determine the actual and desirable business managers’ attentiveness and responsiveness to the enterprise and society’s relationship.
Capstone projects	The program’s culminating experience, the capstone, will assess your ability to synthesize and integrate the knowledge and skills developed throughout your coursework. Prior course assignments scaffold to the final project, so you learn sequential order analysis techniques that transfer to real-life situations in any organization or industry.

Accreditation for Online Masters in Organizational Leadership Programs

Accreditations give recognitions to business and business-related degrees, and accredited organizational leadership programs fall under the same ambit. However, instead of having one accrediting body to look for accreditation, one will find that accreditation depends on the type of degree conferred.

• Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) : A student who earns the MBA with a specialization in organizational leadership will benefit from earning that degree from an AACSB or AACSB International-accredited program. This is because the degree itself is business in nature, and employers will expect anyone with an MBA to have earned it through an accredited institution.
• US Department of Education : Colleges and universities in the US receive accreditation from agencies recognized by the US Department of Education; the accreditation process involves an extensive review of a school’s educational programs and student services
• Society for Human Resources in Management (SHRM) : It’s also possible to find SHRM accreditation or adherence to the SHRM guidelines as a pathway forward. Many online Master’s degrees in leadership carry this accreditation because human resources are closely related to the field.
• Project Management Institute (PMI) : The last type of accreditation offered is from the Project Management Institute, also known as PMI. This recognition is not so much important for accreditation purposes. Still, it provides the certification possibilities and the doors that it can open for you in career progression, e.g., The Program Management Professional (PgMP)® is a visible sign of your advanced experience and skill. It gives you a distinct advantage in employment and promotion.
  Project management is an emerging field, and attending a program that aligns with PMI guidelines paves the way forward to sit for certification as a Project Manager.
  While accreditation does matter for a Master’s in Organizational Leadership, what matters more is whether or not the professional earning the degree will work in a particular industry.
  Since different specialized fields require different accreditation, students should focus on their ultimate career goals when choosing a graduate school for their needs. While we have outlined a few of the top accreditations, you can read more about them in detail here.

Timeline for graduation from Masters in Organizational Leadership Programs

The worth of time is money, especially when you are going for a Master’s degree. There could be an opportunity cost of leaving a job to pursue higher education plus the cost of the Master’s education itself. Therefore, it becomes imperative to consider the timelines involved while choosing an online masters in Organizational Leadership.

A program’s duration may depend on the number of credits involved, the type of coursework, or the enrollment status, i.e., part-time or full-time.

A master’s in organizational leadership typically takes 2–3 years to complete, with full–time students graduating faster than part-time students. Some schools offer accelerated programs that allow students to graduate in less than two years.

Online Masters in Organizational Leadership Programs Admission Requirements

While the admission requirements for admission into a master’s degree in Organizational Leadership online program may differ for various universities, some of the commonly accepted criteria are tabulated below for your ready reference:

Standardized test scores	GRE or GMAT is the most commonly accepted test scores by most universities. In case you want to know how you can go about preparing for these tests, you can read more about GRE test prep here and GMAT test prep here.
Cumulative GPA	Apart from standardized test scores, some universities need a score of 3.0 or higher, while a few of them consider cumulative GPA as a sufficient criteria
Work Experience	A few universities do give weightage to relevant work experience for choosing their candidates; usually, one to three years is considered to be sufficient

Education loan debt is a nagging concern for students as well as for the US Government. The student loan debt statistics for 2020 present a grim picture and show how serious the student loan debt crisis has become for borrowers. As per Forbes, 45 million borrowers collectively owe nearly $1.6 trillion in student loan debt in the US. Student loan debt is now the second-highest consumer debt category – behind only mortgage debt – and higher than both credit cards and auto loans. As per data of the Institute for College Access and Success,  the average student loan debt for members of the Class of 2018 is $29,200, a 2% increase from the prior year.

The cost of an online Master’s in Organizational Leadership depends on several factors. State residency is an important consideration since many colleges and universities charge higher tuition for out-of-state students. However, some schools charge flat tuition for online students regardless of state residency. Technology fees are another key factor; these fees often apply to online students but not their brick-and-mortar counterparts. Overall, students should expect to pay $13,000 to $32,000 in total tuition for online Masters in Organizational Leadership programs.

We outline a few ways you can go about paying for the online Master’s program you choose to go for: