MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

Management Consulting
Management consulting skills, whether performed as a career or used as part of a managerial toolbox, are a key MBA competency. This stream focuses on the depth and breadth of knowledge and skills required for strategic business management; and those needed to become an effective management consultant.

Well-trained management consultants are in demand
The complexities of modern business mean that executives don’t always have the capacity or knowledge to tackle every aspect of their business. This reality has given rise to the management consulting industry which supports executives in dealing with a range of challenges whether relating to strategy development, profit enhancement, productivity improvement, organisational redesign or facing competitive threats.

Gain marketable skills from leading academics and consultants
The Management Consulting specialisation stream offers:

• Promising career opportunities in management consulting firms, corporations and start-ups
• Future-focused marketable skills, particularly in value creation, problem solving and solution design
• Specialist knowledge from practitioners and academics. The course is convened by a senior partner at a leading global management consulting firm and includes frequent interaction with senior practising consultants and strategy managers.

Is this stream for me?
You will find this stream highly beneficial if you:

• Have an interest in management consulting or strategic management
• Want to understand and master overall business skills, rather than one business function
• Have the drive to solve complex business problems and facilitate implementation of solutions
• Are interested in identifying and generating business value
• Have a mix of analytical and creative skills. 

Key outcomes
On completion of the core courses and electives in this stream, you will be able to:

• Apply a consulting approach to a range of business challenges and contexts
• Analyse business scenarios and develop relevant, workable solutions that take into account a wide range of relevant factors – from control systems to change management
• Synthesise all of your course work towards value creation
• Use your specialised skills for business problem solving and solution implementation
• Use your highly developed communication skills in a consulting or managerial role

Career prospects

• Internal consulting
• Strategy – within a corporation
• General Manager with strategic focus
• Management consulting – whether large, generalists or niche

Marketing Management 
This stream allows students to specialise in all aspects of marketing and marketing strategy. This is valuable for those choosing a career in marketing, particularly in senior management roles, or for entrepreneurs needing the skills to grow their businesses in a competitive environment. The Marketing Management stream will equip you to make good strategic decisions based on relevant data, strategically manage brands in the complex emerging market context and use digital marketing tools to create maximum customer value.

The Marketing Management stream offers specialised knowledge in:

• Marketing Strategy
• Brand Management
• Digital Marketing
• Marketing Metrics

Is this stream for me?
You will find this stream highly beneficial if you:

• Are planning a career change from a generalist to a specialist role
• Have followed a career in marketing and want to move into a senior marketing role
• Are an entrepreneur seeking marketing skills to grow your business in a competitive digital environment.

Key outcomes
On completion of the core courses and electives in this stream, you will be able to:

• Make sound business and strategic marketing decisions to create customer value based on market research and diverse data sources
• Strategically manage a brand in complex traditional and digital contexts

Career prospects

1. Senior management positions in marketing and brand management
2. Digital marketing
3. Product development
4. Business development
5. General management
6. Entrepreneurship and growing business start-ups

Innovation and Entrepreneurship 
The Innovation and Entrepreneurship stream is a future-looking specialisation that focuses on innovation and the creation and scale-up of new ventures. The overall aim is to provide excellence in the entrepreneurial process – a skill that is essential for a fast-moving environment.

 The world is full of opportunities to create new firms. And in a world facing major challenges, we also need individuals who can provide solutions through new ventures. Large corporations, too, are in dire need of individuals that can lead and develop new income streams and new products and services. This stream focuses on the creation of venture opportunities, covering key components from the creation of the actual venture to the launch and establishment of the firm. It focuses on real impact and targets societies greatest challenges from a business perspective.

 
Learn through research and experience
The Innovation and Entrepreneurship stream is research and experience based, offering:

• State-of-the-art innovation and entrepreneurship research as a foundation for the programme
• An experience-based process in three simultaneous streams:
  • Foundation – working with a generic scale-up model that could be reproduced over different venture opportunities and contexts
  • The venture process – participants scale-up a real company in real time
  • Close collaboration with industry – the UCT GSB provides exclusive support from experts in areas such as IP law and pricing who also offer input in the venturing process.

Is this stream for me?
You will find this stream highly beneficial if you:

• Want to scale-up a new venture with high impact
• Have an interest in corporate entrepreneurship – working within a large organisation on innovation and new ventures.

Key outcomes
On completion of the core courses and electives in this stream, you will be able to:

• Use a toolkit of entrepreneurial skills to design new business ventures or solutions in existing enterprises
• Analyse the role and process of innovation and entrepreneurship in an emerging market context
• Create and scale-up new ventures as independent start-ups or within an established organisation.

Career prospects

• Entrepreneurship
• New ventures for an existing company that needs to renew its market offering
• Head of Business Innovation
• Head of Business Development

Leadership and Change
Global businesses need ethical, responsible and self-aware leaders who are able to balance the business’ financial success with its social, environmental and ethical impact now more than ever. The Leadership and Change specialisation stream will equip you with the necessary skills to lead in times of change and disruption.

Personal resilience and self-care, complex decision-making, adaptive problem-solving, and the courage to work with imperfection are increasingly more important for high-performing organisations. It is essential to know how to manage yourself in order to manage others and, ultimately, organisations. This stream supports the personal development and maturity necessary for effective leadership.

Gain deep leadership capability
The Leadership and Change specialisation stream offers:

• Personal development and self-awareness
• The capabilities and competencies to navigate effectively in a complex, changing and diverse work environment
• The development of a nuanced and adaptable leadership approach
• The confidence to lead and negotiate change effectively
• The enhancement of the necessary courage to take, and follow-through on, responsible and ethical decision-making.

Is this stream for me?
You will find this stream highly beneficial if you want to be an effective leader in a complex world.

Key outcomes
On completion of the core courses and electives in this stream, you will be able to:

• Demonstrate a deeper understanding of how to overcome personal challenges and ‘imperfections’
• Practise greater rigour in understanding the power of your beliefs, thoughts, emotions, and motivations
• Demonstrate greater rigour in your understanding of the effects of judgement in your life
• Explain the power and valence of your commitment (or non-commitment) to positive purposeful choices
• Demonstrate a greater acceptance of who you are (flaws and all)
• Actively engage in skilful dialogue and debate
• Link behaviour to effective outcomes – personal and organisational
• Be able to more rigorously effect responsible and ethical decisions
• Better understand the risks and challenges around organisational responsibility
• Know how to apply complexity thinking to your current and future work.

Career prospects

• General Manager
• Management Consultant
• Strategist
• Entrepreneur
• Diversity & Inclusion Managers/Specialists
• Organisational Development Specialist
• Personnel Development Specialist
• Human Resource Professional
• Project Manager
• Non-Profit Executive
• Public Relations Specialist
• Organisational Trainer
• Political Advisor
• Politician
• Sales Manager

Operations and Supply Chain Management 
There is a large and growing demand for managers who are able to steer complex, ever-changing and frequently disrupted business operations, particularly in emerging markets. The Operations and Supply Chain Management specialisation stream focuses on the analytical and practical skills needed to meet these challenges and find innovative ways to get services and products to the end consumer.

Traditional concepts of operations and supply chain management have been disrupted

The advent of new types of companies, ways of working and platform businesses (such as Uber and Airbnb) have transformed traditional concepts of operations management, supply chains, customer needs and business processes. Now more than ever, organisations are looking at their operations and supply chains to survive. This stream equips business leaders in a volatile emerging market context, particularly with regards to mobilising new technologies for competitive gain.

Gain targeted analytical and practical skills
The Operations and Supply Chain Management stream offers specialised knowledge in:

• Global Supply Chain Management
• Change Management
• Lean Thinking
• Operational Excellence
• Project Management
• Service delivery processes.

Is this stream for me?
You will find this stream highly beneficial if you:

• Are considering expanding your firm into new markets
• Want to educate yourself about operations best practice and supply chain management across service and manufacturing industries
• Seek to transition from a technical position into a management role
• Are interested in service or manufacturing industry supply chains.

Key outcomes
On completion of the core courses and electives in this stream, you will be able to:

• Design and manage operational approaches to control business processes, even in the face of constant change
• Analyse complex contemporary supply chains and propose effective solutions for emerging market contexts
• Develop operations and supply chain processes, solve problems and develop innovative solutions
• Make operational and strategic decision and implement long-term plans.

Career prospects
This stream will prepare you for operations and supply chain management roles in diverse service and manufacturing industries.

The Corporate Finance specialisation offers specialised knowledge in:

• The capital structure of organisations and their funding sources
• Courses of actions taken by managers to increase a firm’s value to shareholders
• Methods and analysis tools employed to allocate financial resources
• The effect of financial decisions and allocation on emerging countries

Is this stream for me?
You will find this stream highly beneficial if you:

• Are considering expanding your firm into new markets
• Want to educate yourself about operations best practice and supply chain management across service and manufacturing industries
• Seek to transition from a technical position into a management role
• Are interested in service or manufacturing industry supply chains.

Key outcomes
On completion of the core courses and electives in this stream, you will be able to:

• Analyse the financial opportunities and risks in markets and businesses
• Develop flexible, impactful financial approaches suited to listed and unlisted corporate entities
• Formulate financial policies and strategies, and solve asset management problems as they appear in real-life situations
• Apply theoretical frameworks drawn from economics, risk management, accounting, law, quantitative method and finance issues
• Discuss the benefits and side-effects of financial globalization
• Career prospects
• Corporate finance analyst
• Business analyst
• Treasury analyst
• Investment manager
• Venture capitalist
• Financial planner
• Financial director
• Chief financial officer
• Development economist