MIT Sloan Executive Education
Certificate Holder Profile
Todd Little
Senior Development Manager
Landmark Graphics
USA
Executive Certificate(s):
Todd Little began his career as both a petroleum engineer and a software developer. While developing his technical career, he began taking on more and more managerial responsibilities. A colleague highly recommended MIT Sloan, so he decided to attend a course. “I had been managing software and engineering technical professionals for a while and was a bit surprised by how much I learned from the experience. I found Managing Technical Professionals and Organizations to be so valuable that I helped arrange for it to be given on-site at Landmark.”
Shortly after Todd attended the first program, Landmark arranged for Managing a Successful Technology and Product Strategy to be given on site by Rebecca Henderson. “I was familiar with much of the work of Geoffrey Moore and Clayton Christiansen and found this course to provide practical insight into the market dynamics of technology products,” Todd notes, “The course was so favorably viewed by the Landmark attendees that Ms. Henderson was invited to be a keynote presenter at our annual technology conference.”
As Todd continued his management career at Landmark, he found that his interests had expanded beyond technology and into the dynamics of the business and the interconnection of the systems, which led him to take Business Dynamics. “I had read Peter Senge's The Fifth Discipline a few years earlier and looked forward to attending this course. There is nothing like getting it from the horse's mouth,” adds Todd. “The Sloan School is the clear leader in systems thinking and systems dynamics.”
Todd states that Strategic Marketing for the Technical Executive and Fundamentals of Finance for the Technical Executive helped to round out his executive training. “At the beginning of my career I viewed myself as a technologist. While I loved the technology, I found that I also really enjoyed management and understanding the business. Many technologists really don't understand or want to understand marketing and finance, but technology without a business won't have an impact,” Todd adds. “These two courses in marketing and finance, combined with my technical background and the other courses I took from MIT Sloan have helped me be much more effective in managing the business and the technology.”
