Core Course Descriptions

CORE BUSINESS COURSES

Managerial Accounting
This course introduces concepts and methods of accounting, with the emphasis on uses of accounting information in making economic decisions, controlling organizations and holding organizations accountable to stakeholders. The course studies information that is:

Financial Management
This course provides an introduction to financial decision making – decisions pertaining to investments in projects as well as financing the operations. Topics covered include financial environment, valuation of securities, risk-return relationships, capital budgeting, financial analysis and planning, cost of capital and options.

Marketing Management
This is an introductory course covering high tech marketing. High Tech Marketing is the process of planning and executing the conception, promotion, distribution, and pricing of high-technology goods and services to create exchanges that provide utility for customers and profits for the firms.

Organization Behavior
The main objective of this course is to introduce the basic concepts, theories, and techniques necessary for understanding, designing, and managing organizations in technology intensive organizations. The course specifically focuses on some of the critical managerial tasks/decision in organizations that influence the accumulation and utilization of human capital. It includes not only some of the traditional elements such as organizational structure, human resources management, and organizational structure, but also subjects that are directly relevant for technology intensive organizations such as the design and management of technology alliances and joint ventures; corporate governance; and the management of technical careers in organizations. Instead of focusing merely on the individual employees, their motivation, or managerial leadership, this course emphasizes the tasks of the organizational units, their technologies, and the overall design for effective functioning of organizations within the ever-changing context of the technical environment.

Process Management
This course looks at both the design and management of processes needed for developing new products or services, producing them, and distributing the finished goods or services. Process Management includes a myriad of activities: ensuring that a product or service is of high quality, choosing the appropriate design and technology for designing and producing a good or service, planning and controlling the flow of materials or customers so that lead times are minimized, and distributing finished goods or services. This course focuses primarily on developing and applying tools and techniques to ensure that the right products and resources are at the right place at the right time so as to maximize profit within a business process.

The Quantitative Analysis of Decisions
Solving business problems can involve many factors, constraints, and objectives. This course introduces tools and techniques for applying quantitative techniques to decision making. The process of building a mathematical model along with the use of a spreadsheet as a decision aid will be discussed.

TECHNOLOGY MANAGEMENT COURSES

Intellectual Property Management
How do firms compete with ideas? How do they create, exploit and vindicate intellectual property (“IP”) assets and capabilities in competition with others at home and abroad? We will address these critical questions, and gain a better understanding of what IP is, how firms nurture its creation, protect and meter its use, and integrate it into the broader competitive strategy of the firm. We will also investigate different types of IP legal regimes around the world, and investigate how multinational firms manage these regime differences for competitive advantage globally. We will do this through review and discussion of published legal decisions, international agreements, business case studies and in-class exercises designed to highlight practical challenges that managers face when deciding how best to protect, transfer and or exploit IP within and across markets. Students should come away from this course with practical management insights and techniques for dealing with IP issues and helping the firm compete with ideas more effectively.

Managing Innovation
One of the primary tasks of management is making decisions about policies, practices, procedures, and structures that facilitate accomplishing organizational goals. In other words, a manager’s responsibility is the creation and maintenance of organizations; delegating tasks, devising strategy, creating routines, monitoring performance, resolving disputes, and managing people so that the organization can best achieve its goals. The implications of these managerial tasks are magnified when performed amidst the uncertainty associated with managing the development of new products, technologies, and other organizational innovations, or when competitors innovate.

This course is designed to consider the problems that arise in managing organizations for innovation. This course will explore each week a different managerial issue or dilemma that can occur when organizations attempt to innovate, are unable to innovate, or are faced with decisions to innovate. Using the principles of organization theory and design, a range of actions available to managers faced with these dilemmas and the role of organization design in helping or hindering innovation efforts will be investigated.

New Product Development
New product development is a strategic activity for most firms. Success in new products becomes vital as product life cycles shorten due to increased competition and quickly changing consumer preferences. This course is intended to provide students with the ability to manage new product development through participating in a real development project for a client firm. In addition, we will be exploring marketing research methods, current critical topics in new products, and organizational issues through readings, case discussions, and project assignments.

Project Management
The objective of this course is to master the principles of efficient project planning and control – needs analysis, work breakdown, scheduling, resource allocation, risk management, and performance tracking and evaluation – within the timeframe and cost projections stated in the overview section. Concepts and techniques will be developed by navigating through a recent textbook in project management and through a popular project management software package. In addition, task teams of five members each will have the opportunity to hone skills through homework problem sets and a comprehensive project plan.

Simulation and Risk Analysis
This course provides quantitative tools for solution of management problems involving risk, competing objectives, and complex constraints. The course will provide hands-on experience with techniques for solving these problems, with a particular emphasis on models and methods that enable managers to proactively manage and mitigate risk, obtain insight, and support decision making. Models are illustrated with applications to operations management, finance, and marketing, with a particular emphasis on issues associated with project portfolio management. Hands-on modeling skills are developed using spreadsheet-based software tools. We will consider challenges that executives and organizations encounter when implementing these approaches, and demonstrate how mathematical models can improve on "seat of the pants" methods.

Supply Chain Management
Fierce competition in today’s global markets, the introduction of short life-cycle products, and heightened customer expectation have forced the business enterprises to invest in, and focus attention on, their supply chains like never before. This course focuses on managing material and information outside of the factory walls including aspects of demand planning and forecasting, inventory deployment, distribution system design, channel management, procurement, and logistics. We explore order fulfillment strategies and the impact of the Internet on distribution and back-end supply chain processes. We also examine strategies for enterprise integration. Stumbling blocks for supply chain integration such as high transaction costs between partners, poor information availability, and the challenges of managing complex interfaces between functional organizations have been rapidly dissolving on the web. We study the impact of these changes on traditional supply chains and on the creation of virtual chains.

Technology Strategy
The course on Technology Strategy deals with those decisions that determine future directions of the technology intensive organizations and effective implementation of the directions chosen. Technology Strategy will addresses the organizational structure, resources & capabilities, and strategic positioning of the firm to create, capture, and sustain competitive advantage in high technology industries. In this course, students will develop skills at understanding how firms gain and sustain competitive advantage, analyzing strategic business situations and formulating strategy, and implementing strategy and organizing the firm for strategic success. It includes not only some of the traditional elements of strategic management such as industry analysis, competitor analysis, generic strategies, and diversification, but also subjects that are directly relevant for technology intensive organizations such as sources of innovation, types and patterns of innovation, standards battles, timing of entry, collaboration strategies, and protecting innovation.

Technology Practicum
The dynamics of technology-based competition are driven by unique uncertainties from the market, from technology, and from society. Therefore, technology managers need to be proficient in managing at the interface of technology, business, and society. The technology practicum provides practical experience in understanding the dynamics of technology-based competition.

Each year this two semester course will focus on a particular technology of emerging importance in the global economy. Students will work in groups to develop a technology roadmap assessment of the potential impact of the target technology in specific business applications. The practicum provides students both a framework to understand the dynamics of technology-based competition and experience in assessing the future dynamics of specific technology applications. As a capstone to the MS-Tech program, it also provides students a chance to integrate and apply their course experiences to an issue of current business interest.