Executive MBA Courses

The human side of management is one of the most significant factors in successful management of any organization. In this trimester, the participants learn new skills and enhance their capacity to lead people and manage human issues in complex organizations. Readings, self-exploration, experiential exercises, and interaction with faculty and fellow students provide an opportunity not only to explore, but also to apply principles dealing with an array of current organizational behavior issues.

MBAA 651. Understanding Human Behavior, Leading People and Change in Organizations (6)

Leading People Across Diverse Contexts: The human side of managerial leadership is one of the most significant factors in successful management of any organization. Participants will learn new skills and enhance their capacity to lead people and manage human dynamics in organizations across diverse situational contexts. Readings, self-exploration, experiential exercises and interaction with faculty and fellow students provide an opportunity not only to explore, but also to apply principles dealing with an array of current organizational behavior issues.

MBAA 641. Applied Strategic Research Project–Organizational Behavior (2)

The Applied Strategic Project provides students with the opportunity to apply the knowledge, perspectives and analytical skills acquired through their course work in MBAA 651 to an appropriate business problem or opportunity of their choosing. This application typically involves analyzing an organizational culture and formulating change management strategies that positively impact key result areas, performance and the student as an agent of change.

Management decision making requires the use of appropriate tools and techniques for analyzing financial and quantitative data. In this trimester, students examine conceptual models of decision support systems and appropriate technologies to give the executive more practical tools for analytical and creative problem solving. Building upon these tools, students will progress to the management accounting course to acquire knowledge and skills to identify critical performance measures for managing a business. The trimester concludes with a course on the strategic management of financial resources.

MBAA 672. Quantitative Analysis for Business Operations (4)

Decision support systems (DSS) are powerful tools for improving the productivity of an organization and are integral to the process of developing a strategic plan. Conceptual and practical methods of using decision support systems will be explored to provide tools for analytical and creative decision making, problem solving, and planning. Students explore theoretical and practical modern decision systems and examine both quantitative and creative methods for making decisions. Topics include general systems theory, critical success factors, balanced scorecards, research methods, techniques for assessing the internal environment, and forecasting methods.

MBAA 652. Financial Controls and Strategic Issues in Corporate Finance (4)

The course introduces students to a wide range of accounting and internal control issues. Students use a variety of tools to interpret and analyze financial statements, including ratio analysis, tend analysis, common size analysis and free cash flow. Students also examine a variety of real-world financial management issues, including working capital management, capital budgeting, debt versus equity financing, valuation techniques, and merger and acquisitions transactions.

MBAA 642 Applied Strategic Research Project–Finance (2)

The focus of the Accounting and Finance Applied Strategic Research Project (ASRP) is to identify the major financial strengths and weaknesses of an organization. Work includes: Reviewing an organization’s historical financial statements; Exploring aspects of the organization’s control environment; Comparing the organization’s performance metrics to those of similar entities; Examining major components of the organization’s cash flow; Forecasting financial statements; Employing market multiples and free cash flow to gauge the organization’s valuation.

The focus of this trimester is on providing a detailed examination of market and economic factors that are critical to the strategic planning process from both national and international perspectives. Students explore the ways in which key decisions are influenced by market and economic considerations and how firms market products and services to serve customers in different industrial and market settings. Students learn how to forecast the impact of fluctuations in economic and market variables (i.e., demand, pricing, and promotion) for performance in competitive markets.

MBAA 653. Business Competitiveness and the Macro Environment (4)

This course is concerned with the examination of the economics of the firm and the macro environment, which includes the influences of economic, political, social, technological, and legal forces as a foundation for strategic management in a multinational arena. Students appreciate the changing dynamics of the structure, conduct, and performance of domestic industries in preparation for understanding foreign country risk analysis and international business activities. Business production; the management of cycles, trends, and forecasts; as well as the role of government are studied within a changing domestic and global perspective of markets. Students will learn to perform comprehensive analysis of business decisions. The impact of government policies in the business environment is also examined.

MBAA 643. Applied Strategic Research Project–Economics (2)

The applied strategic research project is the application of the economic theories, frameworks, and tools acquired in MBAA 652. This application includes an industry analysis, focusing on the external environment and its impact on the industry environment. Implications for organizational strategy, and industry outlook, are drawn from the analysis.

MBAA 678. Managing Information Systems for Business Innovation (3)

This course aims to provide students with an understanding of the nature of IT-based information systems and how firms can gain competitive advantage by using information systems to enable business innovation through redesign of product and service offerings, business and organization processes, and organization structures. The course also will provide students with the knowledge and skills to effectively manage the acquisition, implementation, and use of information systems to bring about business innovation.

In the penultimate trimester of the EMBA program, the students continue to integrate the concepts and management tools they have studied thus far. In particular, the trimester focuses on the application of this accumulated learning to the competitive and strategic challenges of contemporary marketing in both the domestic and the global environment. The students will gain firsthand experience of the international marketplace through participation in an eight-day visit to Europe, Asia, or Latin America; this session requires the students to complete a cross-cultural project embracing conditions, strategies, and practices in global business management. In addition, the trimester incorporates a two-day ethics and law session during which the students explore and assess concepts of morality, ethics, social responsibility, law, and criminality. Particular emphasis is placed on the consequences of executive conduct and decision making.

MBAA 690. Contemporary Legal, Regulatory, and Ethical Issues in Business (1)

This course offers students a framework for understanding the intimate connection between ethics, law, and regulation in business environments. The course aims to provide a solid grounding in the fundamental ethical and legal principles that business executives must know to successfully conduct business to avoid increasingly severe criminal and civil sanctions and attendant negative publicity. Topics that will be covered include an overview of the U.S. legal system and an analysis of the fundamental ethical and legal principles of U.S. and international business law. Student will be encouraged to scrutinize their own personal and business conduct and that of their organizations to determine whether both they and their organizations are complying with the ethical and legal standards of the 21st century.

MBAA 694. Business and Management Practices in Global Settings (3)

This course focuses on tools and techniques to develop and sustain a long lasting global competitive advantage. It offers the students firsthand experience in international business and management. The students travel abroad for eight days and are provided opportunities to interact with business executives and country officials. The class will examine practices that lead to effective implementation and management in a variety of challenging environments. Culture, economy, marketing, finance, operations, and technology-enriched dimensions of building globally and locally competitive business enterprises are explored. Issues relating to global implementation of the grand strategy along functions (i.e., finance, marketing, human resources, operations) and lines of business are studied. Single-and multi-business organizations, multinational organizations, new ventures, alliances and partnerships, as well as established organizations in a variety of global industries are studied.

MBAA 654. Competing in Local and Global Markets (4)

To enable to you organize, integrate, and extend your understanding of marketing. This will be accomplished by pulling together the materials from the marketing curriculum through a case analysis approach. Cases allow us to learn about company situations and predicaments and what good marketing practice suggests these firms should do to solve their problems.

MBAA 644. Applied Strategic Research Project–Marketing (2)

To learn how to do an applied, guided research project that is practical and relevant using the resources that are supplied by the university and your organization. To develop the ability to conduct marketing research for a specific initiative, use segmentation to focus resources and develop a marketing plan.

In this final trimester of EMBA, the students learn to view critical strategic issues of the firm from a senior executive's perspective and think and implement strategically. The trimester has four streams of activities: crafting the grand strategy, implementing the strategy, strategic management simulation, and strategic management project. The crafting strategy stream focuses on integrating concepts and lessons learned in prior trimesters, learning new strategic concepts, generating and analyzing strategies, and developing superior strategies and the grand strategy in a global environment. The second stream focuses on the opportunities and challenges in implementing the grand strategy. Students learn concepts and practical methods of implementation. This involves learning how to design enabling organizational structures, processes, and measures for effective alignment of performance to the strategy. The third activity involves students conducting a strategic management simulation, which highlights key aspects of managing a company in an evolving industry and changing environment. The fourth stream requires students to prepare and complete their capstone strategic management projects. They integrate and build on this and previous courses' concepts and apply them to their firms in their strategic management projects.

MBAA 655. Strategically Managing Organizations (6)

Students will learn to view critical strategic issues of the firm from a senior executive’s perspective and think and implement strategically. The trimester has four streams of activities: analyzing the internal and external environments, crafting the strategies, implementing the strategies, and the business management simulation. The strategic analysis and strategy formulation streams focus on integrating concepts and lessons learned in prior trimesters, learning new strategic concepts, generating and analyzing strategies, and developing superior strategies in a global environment. The third stream focuses on the opportunities and challenges in implementing the strategies. Students learn concepts and practical methods of implementation. This involves learning how to design enabling organizational structures, processes, and measures for effective alignment of performance to the strategy. The fourth activity involves students conducting a business management simulation, which highlights key aspects of managing a company in an evolving industry and changing environment.

MBAA 645. Applied Strategic Research Project–Strategy (2)

The Applied Strategic Research Project–Strategic Management provides students with the opportunity to apply the knowledge and analytical skills acquired through their course work in Trimester V and to integrate the applied strategic plans completed in previous trimesters into an overall, integrated, comprehensive strategic plan for the chosen organization.