Course Descriptions
This course surveys micro- and macroeconomic principles, with an emphasis on strategic applications. Microeconomic topics covered include: demand and supply, elasticities, firm cost structure, market structure, and pricing. Macroeconomic topics covered include national income accounting, national income, employment, and price level determination, money supply determination, and fiscal and monetary policy. Three credit hours. An introduction to the principles of accounting with emphasis on preparation and analysis of the four general purpose financial statements, the accounting cycle, and the types of business entities. Issues covered include cash, receivables, inventory, long-term assets, liabilities, stocks, and bonds. Three credit hours. MBA 502 Mathematics for Managers This course surveys elementary algebra and calculus, emphasizing practical applications in management and economics. Topics covered include: systems of linear equations, matrices, linear programming, techniques of differentiation and integration, nonlinear optimization and applications. Three credit hours. This course provides the basis for building decision models reflecting strategic business decision making. Various statistical methods will be analyzed that are crucial to various areas of business behavior. These include: data summarization, probability theory, statistical decision analysis, sampling and hypotheses testing, and simple linear regression. Three credit hours. MBA 600 Multimedia Applications in Business This course presents principles of multimedia to the business professional. Several major categories that will be discussed include: the use of video and animation in design, preparation of graphic files, and imaginative use of clip art materials. As part of this course, students will create a multimedia presentation using audio, video, still images, graphics, and text. The majority of class time will be spent in the lab familiarizing oneself with the various software applications available to create multimedia presentations. Three credit hours. Prerequisite: basic understanding of the Macintosh Operating System. MBA 601 Strategic Human Resource Management The way we manage the people in our organizations needs to be aligned with our business strategies. The means for this alignment is human resource strategy--a directional plan for managing human resources that addresses important people-related business issues. The purpose of this course is to examine how managers may implement more effectively the people-intensive strategies that are rapidly becoming a primary source of competitive advantage. Only by addressing human resource issues in the context of overall strategic management will managers and human resource staffs together achieve the results needed to sustain and develop a business. Three credit hours. MBA 602 Organizational Behavior and Development The objective of this course is to provide a broad survey of the field of organizational behavior on three distinct levels of analysis--individuals, groups, and organizations. Specific topics to be examined from these three perspectives include but are not limited to: motivation, job design, leadership, diversity, organizational design, communication, decision-making, conflict management, power, innovation and the work environment. Special attention will be given to the most common organizational development methods used in solving managerial and organizational problems. The course examines such intervention strategies as team building, team skills training, survey-feedback, sensitivity training, behavior modification, job enrichment, and management by objectives. Three credit hours. This course is an in-depth study of cost behavior and its implications on cost-volume-profit analysis and variance analysis. Current topics in product costing are reviewed including process costing, job order costing, activity based management and just-in-time inventory. Operational decision making, pricing decisions, strategic planning and strategic cost analysis are examined. Three credit hours. Prerequisite: MBA 501. MBA 604 Marketing Through New Media This course looks at the graphical user interfaces of multimedia presentations and the effectiveness within the business marketplace. Various authoring software packages will be analyzed for their effective use of QuickTime movies, animation, graphics, and still images. Interactive design elements will be a main focus. For example, the layout, choice of interface design elements (e.g., buttons, menus, popups, sliders, etc.), use of color, choice of background textures, and typography, within the multimedia presentation will all be studied. Discussions of the copyright laws that are in effect and not yet in effect regarding fair use and distribution will be debated. Throughout the course an emphasis will be planned on any new media tools to serve businesses. Three credit hours. Prerequisite: MBA 600. This course develops the theoretical and practical uses of financial management principles, including the concepts of risk, return, and value. Areas of concentration include working capital management, capital budgeting, the cost of capital, and capital structure. Three credit hours. Prerequisites: MBA 500, 501, 502, and 503. MBA 610 Labor and Employment Law This course provides a comprehensive approach to labor and employment law, legislative foundations of labor laws, and the legal processes and institutions that add to their effectiveness. The course will address a variety of topics including the National Labor Relations Act, contract negotiations, strikes, unfair labor practices, federal and state employment law, and equal employment opportunity legislation. A wide range of contemporary issues will also be addressed, including contractual interpretation, discipline and discharge matters, and conduct off the job. Current industrial relations policies and practices are highlighted with case problems and leading court decisions that offer additional insights into employee-management relations. Three credit hours. MBA 611 Strategic Planning and Staffing This course deals with the processes, concepts and techniques relevant to the manpower planning, recruitment, and selection functions of personnel management. It is designed to expose students, practitioners, and professionals to the entire range of activities associated with staffing work organizations. Specific attention will be given to major areas of interest in personnel psychology, including job analysis and job evaluation, personnel recruitment, screening, and selection, training and development, and performance appraisal. The course is intended to provide valuable insights to human resource professionals, operating managers, students, and others seeking practical guidance on staffing procedures, policies, techniques, and problems. Three credit hours. MBA 612 Compensation, Organizational Strategy, and Firm Performance This course focuses on pertinent theoretical and applied issues in compensation. Relevant topics include job analysis and job evaluation, pricing and job structure, performance appraisal systems, making wage decisions, compensation systems, performance standards, incentive methods, salary administration, and analytical and empirical evaluation of payment techniques and procedures. The focus is multidisciplinary with economic, psychological, sociological, and legal perspectives interjected where appropriate. Three credit hours. MBA 613 Strategic Training and Human Resource Development Training and development is viewed by experts in the field as a process that increases the capacity of the human resource through development. As a consequence of this process, value is added to individuals, teams, and the entire organization as a human system. The purpose of this course is to equip students with the skills necessary to assess individual and organizational needs, to design training sessions, to utilize effective training methods, to transfer learning to the work environment, and to evaluate training.Three credit hours. MBA 614 Theory and Practice of Negotiations Negotiation and bargaining skills are essential characteristics of effective management. Whether a manager has formal responsibility for negotiating inter-firm agreements or not, he or she must contend with fellow managers for a share of organizational resources. In simply resolving disputes among subordinates, a manager will regularly be involved in negotiations and bargaining. While these negotiations may yield what appear to be satisfactory outcomes, this course provides a substantive grounding in the analytics of negotiations, which can ultimately improve the chances that satisfactory agreement is achieved in the first place. Three credit hours. This course applies economic reasoning to develop a coherent analytical basis for the formulation and evaluation of the external and internal strategies of the firm. The course emphasizes practical managerial applications of topics from industrial economics and strategy: economies of scale and scope, industry analysis, market structure, commitment, dynamic competition, entry/exit, and the economics of competitive advantage. Three credit hours. Prerequisites: MBA 500, 501, 502, and 503. In this course, techniques of managerial decision making are applied to problems in the management of production and operations in both manufacturing and service organizations. Quality management is emphasized throughout the course. The course emphasis is on people operating in teams for improved delivery of goods and services to customers. Topics covered include: quality assurance and control, forecasting, aggregate planning, scheduling, inventory planning and control, facility location, and process and job design. Three credit hours. Prerequisites: MBA 500, 501, 502, and 503. MBA 622 Multinational Business This course is about how firms become and remain international in scope. It deals with the experiences of firms of all sizes, from many countries, as they come to grips with an increasingly competitive global environment. It is about the practice of management when a home market perspective is no longer enough. Through carefully selected comprehensive case studies and integrated text material, this course bridges both the internationalization process and multinational management. Three credit hours. Prerequisites: MBA 500, 501, 502, and 503. This course presents the importance of the marketing function in the strategic management of the organization. Within the framework of the marketing discipline, students will learn how to ascertain customer needs and to strategically plan to fill those needs while serving an increasingly diverse population. Also considered in this course are issues such as environmentalism, consumerism, consumer life style and government regulation. As part of this course, students will identify actual consumer needs and devise a comprehensive strategic marketing plan to fill them. Three credit hours. MBA 624 Strategic Management of Technology and Innovation A text- and cases-based course on the strategic management of change. Emphasis is on decision making as a learning activity in a context of transformational uncertainty. Topics include: the role of innovation in competitive advantage, designing and implementing a technology strategy, forecasting the advent of novel technologies, appropriating the benefits of new technologies without undue risk exposure, and managerial styles and corporate cultures that enhance technological leadership and innovation. Three credit hours. Prerequisites: MBA 500, 501, 502, and 503. The first of a two course integrative capstone experience, this course will teach managers to think and act strategically. Emphasis will be placed on the creation of competitive advantage within a dynamic environment. A variety of analytical techniques will be discussed that will enable managers to thoroughly analyze the organization's environment in order to clearly identify its competitive advantage and how the organization will seek to utilize this advantage. Topics to be covered include various strategic management decision models, industry analysis, competitive position analysis and the analysis, choice and implementation of strategic options. Case studies will be utilized as the primary method of familiarizing students with the strategic analysis process. Three credit hours. Prerequisite: completion of all M.B.A. Core Courses and at least 6 credits of the Concentration. MBA 631 Integrative Case Studies A final capstone experience, this course is intended to provide a complete integration and application of previous course work. The course consists of three parts: a series of case analysis discussions, a business simulation game in which student teams will compete with each other in a computer simulated business, and a final presentation. The final presentation is to be a significant portion of the grade in this course. For purposes of this presentation, student teams will do an extensive analysis of an existing business and report on their findings in both a written report to management and a full period oral presentation. Three credit hours. Prerequisite: MBA 630.
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