From the President of the Leadership Institute of Seattle
Thank you for your interest in the Leadership Institute of Seattle (LIOS) Master of Science in Leadership and Organization Development.
LIOS is committed to providing top quality small group experiential education in its pursuit to educate senior executives, high potential employees, union officials, change agents (internal and external), organization development practitioners and others.
The program helps leaders at all levels learn to utilize their own strengths, through extensive personal and interpersonal development, to pursue and achieve individual, business, and social justice goals. Goal attainment is aided by student’s new self-awareness, awareness of how to create effective groups, and the learning of systems thinking related to work as well as multiple tools and interventions.
LIOS is specifically designed to help participants gain the skills and knowledge necessary to support the business strategies of their organizations. Core to LIOS is its ability to help leaders acquire the strong set of interpersonal skills and deep self-awareness necessary to bring an authentic and connected presence to their workplace.
This is a program for those who want to be both supportive of and influential with others and who believe their personal development is central to achieving organizational objectives. Effective leaders are willing to suspend blame in favor of getting results and are able to keep relationships intact while giving and receiving feedback non-defensively. Such effective leaders easily initiate open dialogue and are willing to work in partnership with others.
LIOS has three core focuses around which our curriculum is built:
- Use of Self (Developing unique presence)
- Group Process and Intact Workgroup Development (Boss and direct reports)
- Whole Organization Change (Systems thinking)
LIOS has a long and distinguished heritage. I have been associated with it since 1993, first as a student and then through the years as adjunct faculty and now as President. So, I can sincerely recommend this graduate school experience to you. It is life-changing and life-giving on the individual level, and transformational in all types of work groups, organizations and society as a whole.
Robert Crosby, my father, founded LIOS in 1969 and, in 1973, the fundamental curriculum was initially offered as a Master’s Degree by Whitworth College in Spokane, Washington. It has evolved over the years in different university settings, including a corporate program through Alcoa and now, in 2025, in its current re-birth, as an Independent College.
Robert contributed the intellectual foundations for LIOS standing on the shoulders of Kurt Lewin and John Dewey with hands-on knowledge passed on to him by colleagues and students of those two foundational figures. LIOS has been shaped over the years by many people. Its roots go back to the original faculty Ron Short and John Scherer who, along with Robert, often met and planned lessons in the back yard that I grew up in on the south hill of Spokane, Washington.
Your experience in this program will be a rich and positive one. On behalf of myself and the faculty and over 1500 LIOS alumni, I invite you to join our learning community!
Best Regards,
Chris Crosby
President
Leadership Institute of Seattle