DBS & EBS Executive MBA – (MBA)

Contents

Our Executive MBA is a 2-year, part-time programme with two 6-day residentials in the UK, eleven 3-day core courses (Thursday to Saturday) in Germany, five 3-day elective courses (Thursday to Saturday) in Germany, the UK or other international locations and optional 6-day International Study Weeks. The programme commences in January each year with a 6-day residential induction in Durham that is designed to introduce you to DBS and EBS and to your fellow participants. Core module teaching also starts during this time.

The programme itself mirrors much of the Global MBA programme itself in terms of its modular structure, with progression from foundational core modules, through the more specialized electives phase, culminating in the production of an original supervised MBA Business Project (dissertation).

Core modules The six core modules provide an understanding of relevant, cutting-edge management issues from an academic perspective. A multi-disciplinary approach encourages a critical exploration of knowledge areas that underpin management activity and are relevant to the analysis of business practices. The broad-based curriculum addresses contemporary management and business issues, deepening your critical awareness and understanding. The core modules are:-

Managing in the Global Competitive Environment:Explores the complex environmental pressures on organizations, how they can respond to these influences and the key management issues involved in aligning these forces. The theme takes an integrated perspective of the operating environment of organizations from the standpoint of marketing and operations management.

Managing in the Global Environment: Enables you to acquire and develop specialist knowledge and a critical understanding of key macro and micro elements of economic analysis relevant to business decision-making and planning in the global economy.

Managing Finance: Provides you with an appreciation of the financial tools of business management, in particular the techniques of financial statement analysis, and an understanding of the key requisite skills for valuing investments and financial securities. It provides a critical evaluation of the factors affecting the finance mix of a firm and the financial markets in which firms operate giving insight into topical issues in this area.

Managing People: Delivers a critical understanding of the complex nature of contemporary organizations to facilitate exercising independent judgement when analysing organizational and managerial issues. It enables you to develop an understanding of the changing nature of management and appreciate the contribution of Human Resource Management to organizational functioning.

Modeling and Analysis for Management: Provides you with a detailed knowledge of key concepts in data description and statistical modelling; monitoring and hypothesis testing; linear models; and how to apply them to complex management problems.

Strategic Management: Provides an understanding of strategy formulation and implementation under conditions of changing industry competition, firm resources and technology by examining how companies attempt different business and corporate strategies to achieve a significant competitive advantage.

Elective modules Delegates on the DBS-EBS Executive MBA programme undertake five elective modules. These present an opportunity to study topics of your choice in more depth. They allow you to enhance and deepen your knowledge and skills in areas of particular interest and relevance to your future career aspirations.

You choose five electives from a broad portfolio of topics. If you wish to tailor your Executive MBA to a certain area, you could pick electives dedicated to that subject area. Alternatively, you may wish to choose diverse electives to continue the general management theme of the programme. The electives we offer vary depending on current faculty, research and relevance to business. They take place in Durham, Frankfurt, or in other international locations. Indeed, we also offer Durham Executive MBA elective modules and Global MBA Residencies to our DBS-EBS programme delegates, further enhancing the degree of choice available.

MBA business project (dissertation) The DBS-EBS Executive MBA Programme culminates in a 15,000-word dissertation on a business project chosen by you, and overseen by a faculty supervisor with relevant academic/consultancy experience. The dissertation is an independent piece of research that should be regarded as an exercise in the analysis, interpretation and presentation of information, observations and ideas. Normally it involves the systematic study of a problem using an appropriate theoretical framework.

This is a very rewarding part of the MBA learning experience across our programmes. The compulsory Methods of Inquiry module provides insight into the research project and must be undertaken before starting the dissertation.