Spring Year 2
This course focuses on mergers and acquisitions as key instruments of corporate strategy. It explores how firms use these investment vehicles to obtain economies of scope, cross-selling advantages, and other benefits such as corporate renewal and innovation. Students learn about the risks and challenges of these deals, which have failure rates as high as one-half to two-thirds, according to many studies. They also examine various deal-making pitfalls and post-acquisition management problems, as well as effective integration planning and post-merger integration.
This applied course provides a toolkit for decision-makers to answer three fundamental questions in finance: Is this a good business project? How should it be financed? How much funding is required? The tools include financial statement forecasting, growth-financing requirements, working capital management, debt versus equity optimal capital structure, the determination of cash retention and payout ratios, and valuation techniques using discounted cash flows and peer price multiples. Students analyze topics through various case studies.
Throughout this course, students consider the interconnectedness of law, ethics, values, public policy, regulation, and personal leadership. In addition, they are asked to consider alternative views of the role of business in our global society, and to reflect on how personal values shape our leadership and business conduct. The course allows students to consider the relationship between law and ethics in the broader social context, which is necessary to successfully navigate an increasingly complex, global business environment.
This course focuses on what it means to be an information-based organization. It explores how digital-enabled processes are used to create and capture value for organizations. Through case studies, research reports, practical exercises, and interactive discussions, participants learn the how to do the following: align digital technology with an organization’s business goals, and communicate those goals; set business and technology priorities based on those goals; apply concepts, tools and techniques to design appropriate digital business models; analyze and evaluate innovation initiatives in the digital space; and evaluate digital transformation strategies.
This course addresses the strategies and tactics of negotiations in a variety of contexts. It examines—through the eyes of leadership—power and conflict in organizations, addressing concepts that help improve personal negotiating skills. Students examine the sources, uses, and misuses of executive power in organizations, as well as strategies for managing conflict effectively.
This course provides a framework for identifying risks faced by organizations, and for developing risk mitigation plans to manage uncertainty. It explores how corporations face a multitude of risks beyond their control that affect the bottom line—those that are financial in nature, those that are associated with operational decisions, and those that impact reputation. It also addresses new technologies and the need for strong cyber resilience to combat security risks.
This course is designed to provide graduating students with a meaningful international experience. An integrative capstone for the two-year program, it is an international trip designed to give students a better understanding of how business is conducted elsewhere in the world. The course dovetails with other advanced courses in the second-year curriculum that require the integration of business insights. The goal of the course is to help students understand the characteristics of intercultural business relationships that lead to intercultural synergy and synergistic decision-making.