Week 24: Finance Strategy, Managing IT, Negotiations&Conflict Management, International Business and Strategic Implementation (Module 6)

Week 24 has us starting module 6. The courses for this module are:

• MBA 822 Finance Strategy (taught by Wei Wang)
• MBA 840 Managing IT (taught by Jim McKeen)
• MBA 851 Negotiation & Conflict Management (taught by Rick Jackson)
• MBA 853 Strategic Implementation (taught by Tina Dacin)
• MBA 854 International Business (taught by David Detomasi)

Finance Strategy is going to cover Derivative Securities, Options, Capital Structure, Cost of Long-Term Debt and Corporate Restructuring. Dr. Wang seems like a good prof so far, but it is hard to say since we have only had one class. Long puts and short calls are definitely going to be haunting a few people's dreams this week.

Managing IT is going to cover the role of IT, IT planning, leveraging the business with IT, investing in IT, managing technology, delivering solutions, developing IT solutions and knowledge management. Dr. McKeen seems like a good prof, but again we have only had one class. This class is going to make extensive use of cases to help us learn. Originally I thought this was going to be all about the technical aspects of IT, but it is anything but that. This course is all about how IT and technology can be appropriately used and maximized to further the business. Whether it is a calculator or a full blown SAP implementation, if the business isn't fully utilizing the resource then it isn't getting the full benefit. Should be interesting to see where this course goes. With so many people from IT backgrounds the are a lot of people interested in this course.

Negotiations & Conflict Management is going to cover preparation for negotiations, positional bargaining, styles, interest-based and principle-based negotiation, framing, mediation, intraorganizational bargaining, ethics in negotiations and cross-culture negotiations. Dr. Jackson has a unique presence in the classroom and I think this is going to be a very interesting course. The course relies heavily the teachings and a text by the prof, but also on "getting to yes" (ISBN 978-0-14-015735-2).

Strategic Implementation is going to cover crafting strategy, change frameworks, binders, resistance&inertia, change levers, building your team, building urgency, culture, selling the change, influence&persuasion, and networks&social capital. Haven't had this course, but Tina's class was the one I sat in on last year and I remember her being very exciting and energetic. Have to wait till next week to find out if my memory is correct.

International Business is going to cover business-government relations, competitiveness and globalization, country risk, emerging markets & global opportunities, the market & politics of oil, trade & protectionism, WTO & NAFTA, national standards in a global economy, social & legal responsibility of multinationals and the future of the global economy. Dr. Detomasi is a very engaging lecturer. This course is relying on the students to present the cases for each class. In addition everyone needs to do quite a bit of reading in advance. Also, one of the final projects is to pick either Obama or McCain and write the inaugural speech they would deliver should they become president. That should be interesting.

In addition we had a guest speaker on Tuesday. Neil Weinberg, Senior Editor at Forbes, came to give a talk on corporate governance and responsibility. He co-authored the book "Stolen Without A Gun" with Walter Pavlo Jr. which details Walter's slide into white collar crime. Neil was also able to give us his view on the recent events happening on Wall Street. Overall it was very interesting and kind of neat to get to hear first hand from someone at the epicenter of the "credit crisis".

This weekend we are headed to the corn maze on Wolf Island. Should be fun. Also, there was a change to visit with the AMBA program on Thursday evening. We have met them before, but it was good to network a bit more. Also, there is quite a bit of reading that could be completed this weekend, but no rush. We are just a week into this module and already the work is pouring on. This is the last major module prior to the Christmas break, so hopefully that will provide some extra motivation.