EXECUTIVE MBA (EMBA)

Course Descriptions

BA 6322   Financial Accounting – The primary focus of this course is on American accounting in the private, for-profit sector.  A key issue throughout the course will be how American practice impacts the global corporation.  Contrasts will be made of American practice with international standards and those in Europe and in Japan.

BA 6325   Organizational Behavior – This course provides an overview of the various perspectives from which individual, group, and organizational behavior can be studied.  The course emphasizes the development of concepts, insights, and skills needed to effectively manage diverse individuals through a variety of situations in organizations.  Readings, cases, and simulation are included to illustrate the conceptual and applied aspects of individual, group, and organizational behavior.

BA 6326   Statistics – This course provides an overview of statistical methodologies including descriptive statistics, regression analysis, sampling and quality control, forecasting for long and short run periods, decision-making under uncertainty, and the use of linear programming.  The course is taught using lectures, cases, and statistical computer packages. 

BA 6303   Managerial Accounting – This course demonstrates techniques for maximizing shareholder value by correctly assessing the financial outcomes of commonly recurring types of operating decisions.  Techniques for identifying alternatives, assessing relevant costs, and choosing a course of action are illustrated with case studies involving decisions on pricing (including special order and private label pricing), production alternatives (including make or buy), and allocation of care resources.  Topics include cost behavior, cost-volume-profit relations, cost system design and interpretation (including the use of actual costs and standard costs), and identifying the costs and revenues relevant to decisions.  The case will probably have a case orientation.

BA 6324   Fundamentals of Marketing – Research is the formal process of gathering information needed by managers to make decisions with respect to marketing opportunities and problems.  Should a new product be introduced?  Are customers satisfied with our service?  What price should be charged for our brand?  This course is intended to develop skills in the above steps so that students can competently implement marketing research projects in the real world.

BA 6340   Managerial Economics – This course combines both Micro and Macro Economic theories.  The microeconomic topics include economics of the firm, demand and supply factors of production, introduction to welfare economics, game theory for decision-making, and applied agency theory in organizations.  Macroeconomic topics will focus on measuring and modeling macroeconomics activity for the United States and for the global economy.

BA 6323   Business Finance – This course examines topics in finance and investments.  The primary focus will be on corporate investment and financing decisions.  There will be an examination of corporate investment criteria and cash flow estimation, cost of capital and project risk, and capital structure decisions.

BA 6030   Operations Management – This course provides a broad instruction to the fields of operations management and information technology, and covers fundamental concepts and techniques necessary for obtaining world-class performance in these areas.  The course begins with a review of operations management topics and then introduces students to the way information technology is being used to reengineer and dramatically improve business process.  The course also analyzes the strategic use of information technology, reviewing such related topics as electronic commerce and knowledge.

BA 6015   Executive Leadership – The class purpose is to study the topic of leadership in such a way as to promote both an academic and practical understanding of the subject.  It will explore the similarities and differences between effective management and leadership.  Students will explore and work to improve the basic interpersonal skills related to leadership effectiveness.  The class will thoroughly investigate leadership effectiveness from at least three angles: personal leadership, interpersonal leadership, and organizational leadership.  There will be a detailed feedback into how others view the student’s leadership skills.  The class will promote the insight required to effectively write a meaningful personal leadership development plan and help develop a personal leadership “point of view.”

BA 6077   Legal Environment – The primary goal of this course is to introduce participants to a number of legal issues common to all businesses and hopefully, how to mitigate the risk of such disputes – or at least prepare for them.  We will not delve into specialized areas such as securities regulations, environmental laws, etc. which may not be relevant to all industries.  A secondary goal of the course is to hone the participants’ analytical and critical thinking skills.

BA 6331   Business Strategy – This course will focus on problems of strategic management in the modern corporation. Primary emphasis will be placed on cases of success and failure in developing and executing single and multi-business strategies.  Related readings will be used to underline common dimensions of the cases and highlight current theoretical concepts, methods and frameworks.

BA 6352   Marketing Strategy – The objective of this course is to present a dynamic view of competitive brand strategy. The course focuses on understanding, developing and evaluation brand strategies over the life of a product-market.  Topics include strategies for pioneering brands, later entrants, strategies for growth, mature and declining markets.  Recent topics such as hyper-competition and co-competition will be discussed.  In addition, analytical techniques useful for evaluating and implementing strategy including conjoint analysis, analysis of competitive reaction functions, diffusion models, etc., will be described.  Material is presented using a mix of cases and lectures. 

BA 6375   Case Studies in Financial Management – This course is designed to be a practical, overview course in corporate finance.  The objective is to draw together the various topics in managerial finance and present a unified, integrated view of the overall subject area.  The course builds upon and reinforces the theoretical and institutional framework learned in introductory business and finance courses, and primarily through the vehicle of case analyses, seeks to apply these concepts to real or simulated business situations.  The topics covered include financial analysis, capital budgeting analysis, value maximization and corporate governance, capital structure, corporate restructuring, or any other current topic, at the discretion of the instructor.

BA 6005   Strategic HR –  The course examines the techniques, policies, processes, strategies, and practices used by companies and managers to effectively and efficiently utilize human resources. Students will learn how the various “core” areas of human resource management including staffing, performance management, work and job design, training, compensation, and labor relations are aligned to accomplish business objectives. We will examine how the business strategy, legal environment, and design of work affect human resource management. Additionally, because HRM is becoming less of a functional responsibility and more of manager’s responsibility, the theories and techniques taught in the course are applicable for many positions in a wide variety of organizations. 

BA 6336   Entrepreneurship –  This course will teach students the skills required to prepare and to present a professional business plan for an entrepreneurial venture and to enhance the analytical skills needed to identify and properly evaluate a new business opportunity. The course will cover topics including: exploration of financing options for the entrepreneurial company and development of a financing plan; overview of the venture capital process; interviews with and lectures from practicing entrepreneurs who have sought venture capital; and preparation and presentation of a professional business plan.

BA 6074   Mergers & Acquisitions –  This course examines how to execute acquisition transactions starting with strategic rationale followed by deal structure, valuation, and integration issues.  After completing the course, you should have a good understanding of why and how an acquisition can both add and destroy value.  You will gain a greater understanding of how the M & A process works between companies and be in a position to contribute as part of a deal team, integration team, or advisory group.This course focuses on the issues related to the management of companies that operate in multiple countries.  Globalization creates management challenges, such as operating in countries with different legal, cultural, political, and economic systems; creating a sustainable competitive advantage while competing against a global set of competitors; and designing an organization structure that balances local and global needs.  In this course, we will examine frameworks from the strategic management literature that address these issues.