Work Lab at a glance
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Term
Spring
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Units
6
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Eligible students
All MIT Sloan and MIT graduate students
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Bid/Application
Bid
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Prerequisites
No formal prerequisites required. Strongly recommended to take 15.662 People and Profits and 15.768 Management of Services.
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Host organization profile
Mid-to-large manufacturers, logistics companies, or service operations with significant frontline workforces. Regional or state-level organizations managing job training, apprenticeships, or career services.
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Sample sectors
Advanced manufacturing and industrial operations, logistics and warehousing, mining and materials processing
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Sample projects
Sample projects may tackle high turnover, address employee skills gaps, or improve human-technology collaboration.
The class
Investing in people isn't just the right thing to do, it's the smart thing to do. Uncover what makes great jobs work and translate insights into actionable strategies.
Learn the skills to redesign work to improve job quality and competitive advantage. In this hands-on lab, you'll partner directly with employers in New England to tackle real workforce challenges—from reducing turnover to optimizing human-AI collaboration. You'll examine the relationship between the design of jobs, the skills required to perform them, and the ways that good work translates into strong performance. The goal is to learn to identify ways to balance employee well-being with business performance.
The class provides opportunities for learning about complex industrial environments where new technologies are affecting the ways that frontline workers do their jobs. Lessons from the field will be particularly relevant to future operations leaders, consultants, or anyone building people-focused businesses.
By course end, you'll synthesize your fieldwork with academic research and case studies to deliver executive-level recommendations for organizational transformation.
Course structure
Classroom lectures and 2-3 site visits during H3, plus independent team fieldwork. Travel and lodging costs for New England area hosts are covered as approved by MIT Sloan. Project teams of four to six students work independently with faculty and mentors to develop organizational recommendations.
Interested?
Bid for 15.679 Work Lab through the MIT Sloan bidding system starting the first week of December.