Overview

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Before we can lead others well, we must first learn to lead ourselves well. Knowing personal excellence is the culmination of this journey. In this course, you will describe how and why to set goals and create action plans, increase your focus and reduce distraction, harness motivation and flow state for performance, build self-efficacy and agency, and redefine your relationship with stress, anxiety, fear and adversity. This course can be taken for academic credit as part of CU Boulder’s Master of Engineering in Engineering Management (ME-EM) degree offered on the Coursera platform. The ME-EM is designed to help engineers, scientists, and technical professionals move into leadership and management roles in the engineering and technical sectors. With performance-based admissions and no application process, the ME-EM is ideal for individuals with a broad range of undergraduate education and/or professional experience. Learn more about the ME-EM program at https://www.coursera.org/degrees/me-engineering-management-boulder.Happiness

Syllabus

Course Correction: Rethinking the Pursuit of Happiness

We begin this course by questioning a common—but potentially faulty—flight path: the pursuit of happiness. Like chasing a tailwind that keeps shifting, pursuing happiness directly can lead us in circles, never quite reaching cruising altitude. This week, you’ll explore research on the hedonic treadmill, the paradox of happiness, and models of well-being that offer a more grounded, sustainable approach. By the end, you’ll begin recalibrating your internal navigation system—one that’s built for meaning, not just momentary lift.

Staying on Course: Enhancing Focus and Attention

In a world full of turbulence and attention hijacks, staying on course has become a rare skill—and a competitive advantage. This week, you’ll explore how distraction derails performance and how your brain’s craving for instant gratification often pulls you off your intended path. Through strategies rooted in neuroscience and behavior design, you’ll learn how to sharpen your focus and extend your runway of attention when it matters most. By the end, you’ll begin training your brain to fly with more patience, discipline, and purpose.

Keep Moving Forward: Motivation, Procrastination, and Flow

This week, we’ll examine what truly keeps you moving forward—especially when motivation disappears. You’ll explore the surprising roots of procrastination, how it disguises itself, and how to overcome it with strategies grounded in psychology and self-awareness. You’ll also learn how to enter flow state more often—where focus, energy, and satisfaction align to create your highest-performance zone. When you understand your internal propulsion system, you don’t have to wait for motivation—you can fly through resistance with intent.

Steering the Ship: Accountability, Control, and Self-Efficacy

This week, you’ll learn what it means to fully take the controls of your life—through personal accountability, agency, and self-efficacy. In a culture where blame and complaint are common defaults, reclaiming your internal authority is both radical and empowering. You’ll explore the dichotomy of control—what’s in your hands, what isn’t, and how to navigate that distinction with strength. When you steer with clarity and take full ownership of your role, you become the captain of your ship—and the pilot of your own story.

Navigating the Storms of Life: Forging Mettle

We end our course with one of the most essential leadership skills: the ability to navigate life’s inevitable storms. When adversity strikes—and it will—how you respond matters more than what caused it. You’ll explore the differences between resilience, grit, fortitude, and mental toughness, and learn how to build these capacities over time. These aren’t traits you're born with—they're skills you can train, making life not just more endurable, but more meaningful.