Primers in statistics, economics, financial statements and excel spreadsheets.

This unit requires students to provide leadership on a significant strategic issue facing their organisation. Students will be asked to develop a project that can be presented to their organisation¿s Board or senior management that will have a significant impact on the organisation, and will also allow the student to demonstrate their leadership in respect to this issue. Students will be required to apply the cross-disciplinary knowledge, leadership skills and personal attributes developed during the degree to this strategic issue. Thus, as in other parts of the course, the approach to the project must be integrative, applying the theoretical knowledge gained in a practical and relevant manner, and take into account the broader context in which the organisation operates. This is the final component of the Executive MBA, and as such will allow students to draw on the content and experiences from throughout the course. Students will work closely with an in-company sponsor as well as an academic mentor to ensure the project is both of substantial and practical value to the organisation and completed with academic rigor. The completion of this Unit of Study is the final component of the Executive MBA.

This is one of the two foundation modules in the Executive MBA. This module challenges students to examine their own leadership, to develop their self-awareness: what is their impact on their teams, their organisations and their communities. Students develop their understanding of different leadership perspectives by looking at leadership through various lenses: for example, military, political, philosophical, ethical and musical, and examining their application to different business situations. Students have the opportunity to undertake a 360-degree assessment of their leadership style, to receive coaching and to develop a plan for improving their leadership capabilities. Through various constructed experiences, students develop the ability to self-direct, to work in teams, to engage in strategic thinking and self-reflection, to identify and manage power relationships, to negotiate and influence others, to manage the media and to understand the key elements of ethical decision-making. Students will deliver a group presentation demonstrating their understanding of different leadership perspectives and their application to a current management challenge.

Today¿s business leaders need to be able to operate in an interconnected business world. They not only need to understand the fundamentals of managing a business (strategy, marketing, accounting, finance, operations, human resource management, and international business), they need to understand how to operate in a world with high levels of uncertainty, ambiguity and complexity. In this second foundation module, students work on an agribusiness (or similar) project to provide students with a base for learning about business fundamentals within a context of disruption. The module also develops students¿ understanding of the environmental context of business, such as the importance of food, water and soil security in sustaining populations and the impact of food systems and distribution of income on health and well-being of different socio-economic groups. The project gives students the opportunity to continue to develop their team and leadership skills as introduced in EMBA6002 Reframing Leadership, while setting the foundation for business fundamentals.

Even the smallest business today is part of a global network. Businesses large and small source materials from across the globe, and sell to customers around the world. Leaders today need to manage employees from multiple cultures, with diverse educational backgrounds. They need to know how to negotiate with people from a variety of cultural backgrounds. And they need to understand how their businesses impact on the communities in which they are operating. This module takes students to another country (India or similar) to undertake an exercise in creating a social enterprise. Students will formulate a hypothesis prior to departure about what challenge that social enterprise will solve, and then research it upon landing in India. We introduce models of entrepreneurship and innovation, adding them to the toolkit developed in EMBA6003 Managing Connected Enterprises. Students work with faculty members and students from our host institution to uncover cultural differences, and how to manage through them. Students also engage with local customers, suppliers and potential competitors, as well as relevant local government representatives to test the viability of entering a new market. The emphasis of this module is on the team navigating the cultural landscape of entrepreneurial activity in a new market. To complete the projects, students draw on what they have learned in the previous modules, applying the foundation material in a new context.

Technology is impacting every aspect of our lives and businesses today. There are a multitude of case studies on how traditional businesses have been disrupted by technology. The savvy business leader today understands how to take advantage of this technology to grow existing businesses or create new businesses or even new markets. Those that are not adaptable do not survive. In this unit, we visit some of the leaders in the development and application of new technologies, in California in the US. We partner with a US university to access the best academic thought on technology and business, working with academics who have both developed theories of innovation as well as applied it in leading businesses. During the two-week module, students are required to complete a project for a client company that is grappling with technological challenges to its business. They will draw on knowledge about leadership, business fundamentals and entrepreneurial activity developed in the previous three modules. Students are also required to explore the business and social context in which technology is utilised to understand the cultural, social and broader environmental context in which it operates.

The biggest challenge facing most businesses today is that they don¿t anticipate the changes in their market environment that fundamentally threaten the way they do what they do. This applies to the government sector and not-for-profits as much as it does to for-profit businesses. How do businesses ensure that they renew themselves before they become obsolete? This unit of study is the culmination of the previous four Executive MBA units of study, combining entering new markets, incorporating cutting edge technology and using leadership and management foundations to challenge existing business models. We look at existing businesses that have managed this transformation well, and examine those that haven¿t. Students obtain an understanding of how organisations can adapt to disruption. We examine a variety of technological advances such as robotics, nanotechnology, machine learning and artificial intelligence to see how they have transformed business models. We examine how to access, analyse and utilise the massive amount of data that is available. We also examine the impact of technology on the workforce, and the future of work. A major project on a progressive organisation enables students to apply what they have learned to this organisation¿s transformation. The module takes place in two locations relevant to the chosen project ¿ such as the UK, Israel, Germany or similar.