Management Studies

• QST MS 600: MiM Launch
  This course will help students transform interests into professional goals, and these goals into a graduate level, candidate-driven job search. The course integrates resources and activities with live presentations and asynchronous discussions on a range of foundational career management topics. The course will help students to determine professional goals; develop and implement a plan for achieving them; acquire the specific skills and experiences needed to become market ready; and build a personal brand and professional network.
• QST MS 650: Career Foundations
  
• QST MS 660: Career Skill Building
  
• QST MS 715: Customers and Markets
  Although these activities could be considered components of marketing, this course takes the point of view that marketing is fundamentally about driving growth. No matter how we measure this growth (in terms of volume sold, revenues, or profits), it always starts with an understanding of how to create value for the customer. The most successful organizations understand that identifying, producing, delivering and capturing value is a strategic practice on which an enterprise thrives or dies. With so much on the line, growth cannot be relegated merely to the marketing department; it is a mindset to be embraced across the organization. This course provides students with an opportunity to deepen your understanding of the ever-changing world of marketing. It presents advanced concepts marketers in all companies are dealing with to grow their business.
• QST MS 716: Financial Decision Making
  Finance is concerned with the efficient allocation of capital, maximizing operational cash flows and the management of financial risk. Capital is said to be efficiently allocated when the risk/return profile of the investment is in line with investor preferences with respect to risk, time and expected return. This course includes the basics of investment analysis: time-value of money, portfolio theory, risk-return tradeoffs and capital budgeting. Time-value of money refers to the valuation of differing values of expected cash flows across time and accounts for differing levels of expected risk. Portfolio theory refers to the optimization of the weights of investments such that the portfolio outperforms the average of the investments. This is accomplished through the minimization of unnecessary risk. Capital budgeting refers to the process of capital allocation within the business (by managers) such that the financial performance of the firm is maximized.
• QST MS 717: Business Context and Strategy
  This course introduces students to issues associated with formulating and implementing business strategy. It draws on findings from various academic disciplines (e.g., economics, organization theory, sociology, accounting, and management policy) to build a fundamental understanding of how and why some firms achieve and sustain superior performance. Readings and cases lead towards understanding of the underlying economics affecting a firm's external and internal environments and the implications of these fundamental factors for affecting the practice of strategy design. The course is designed to challenge students both inside and outside of the classroom.
• QST MS 718: Competitive Business Simulation
  Deploy the fundamentals of business decision-making in the areas of positioning, product offering, customer service, operations, pricing and marketing to profitably grow a new small business. Measure and assess results through P&L, cash flow, customer satisfaction and market share statements and reports.
• QST MS 742: Financial Reporting and Analysis
  'If you can measure it, you can manage it' is an axiom of management. Accounting is the language of business measurement, the means by which business describes what they do, why they do it, and the value that it generates. In this course, you will be introduced to this language via financial statements: corporate reports, balance sheets, earnings and cash flow analyses, along with CVP-based analysis and decision making.
• QST MS 743: Quantitative Methods for Management Decisions
  This course introduces students to statistics and probability, the means by which we analyze customers, markets, firms, industries. . . any and all aspects of the business experience. The goal is to teach students tools and techniques for analyzing data with an appreciation for the theory underpinning such analyses. How do we collect and analyze data in an unbiased manner?
• QST MS 744: People, Teams, and Organizations
  This course examines how teams function, how individuals within those teams operate, and how team members can deal with the sometimes tricky dynamics of working with others. The course is largely experiential, and involves individual introspection, one-on-one interactions with others, group exercises, and class discussion.
• QST MS 746: Managing Operations
  Operations Management is concerned with the efficient and effective transformation of inputs into outputs. Some examples of inputs are materials, labor, land, capital, time, information and management. Outputs include products, services or information that customers need. Value is added only when the output meets the needs of customers, both internal and external. This course includes process analysis and improvement, inventory and supply chain management, and operations strategy. Process analysis comprises skills and techniques that enable managers to design and manage work processes within the organization to achieve both efficient use of resources and effective performance outcomes. Inventory and supply chain management elevates process analysis to an inter-firm level, enabling managers to deliver better services more quickly and at lower cost. Operations strategy links the value-adding activities of the organization to its overall strategy.
• QST MS 747: Agile Project Management
  In this course, students will learn how to use the concepts, tools and techniques of agile project management to successfully manage projects. System development project failures are generally failures of management, not failures of technology. Agile management, along with an understanding of the appropriate use of technology, is therefore essential. Students will learn how to apply agile project management concepts, tools and techniques in today's dynamic, digital business environment, where projects must be brought to completion under increasingly compressed timeframes and where decisions must be made under conditions of uncertainty.
• QST MS 749: Making a Business Case
  Persuasive written, oral, and interpersonal communications are essential skills that are required for success in every business discipline. In this class, students will learn how to communicate clearly and persuasively, and to connect authentically with their audience, in a way that inspires action. Students will learn to take a point of view on current business issues, support it with logic and evidence, and express it effectively in multiple media, ranging from written to verbal, and from formal to extemporaneous. Best practices for both in-person and virtual remote interactions will be explored and practiced. Coaching will be offered for client project meetings and presentations.
• QST MS 751: Digital Transformation and Growth
  This course introduces students to the challenges and best practices in driving growth through enterprise-wide digital transformation. It builds a fundamental understanding of the data and technology drivers of transformation and the main approaches to harness data and technology to grow their businesses by transforming their sales model, customer experiences or their business/operating model. The course will explore the reasons transformations fail. Students will learn how an employee centric approach to organization development can overcome many of the key reasons for failure.
• QST MS 753: Negotiation and Conflict Management
  This course explores the skills strategies and tactics of both collaborative and competitive negotiations. In addition, we look at team negotiations, multi-party negotiations, agency, stakeholder analysis, preparation, and conflict resolution. The course is largely experiential, and involves individual introspection, one-on-one interactions with others, group exercises, and class discussion
• QST MS 754: Corporate Financial Management
  This course provides an in-depth analysis of financial considerations relating to corporate growth. It addresses the setting of financial and corporate goals in terms of maximizing shareholder wealth and relationships among working capital, debt levels, capital costs, dividend policy, growth and the value of the firm. It also considers the requisite financial analysis associated with mergers and acquisitions and bankruptcy.
• QST MS 756: Leadership and Change Management
  The focus of this course is on leadership from a variety of perspectives: organizational leadership in the external environment, as well as leadership at the top, middle, and lower levels inside organizations. We look leadership from a behavioral, emotional intelligence, and situational point of view, developing students' awareness, mindset, and skills in the process. In addition, we explore the challenges, theories, and skills of change management.
• QST MS 757: Innovation and Entrepreneurship
  This course introduces students to the innovation processes, such as design thinking, and various types and models of innovation. Students will learn current approaches to developing value for innovators, companies, societies, and economies through entrepreneurship. The course will explore various contexts for innovation and entrepreneurship, including new ventures, mature companies, and foreign market entry.
• QST MS 758: Special Topics
  Based on a survey of the student cohort, current and emerging topics most relevant to MSMS students will be presented. Given student backgrounds and career interests, topics such as Lean Six Sigma and Social Media Marketing, in addition to critical managerial topics such as Ethics, are presented.
• QST MS 759: Consultative Selling
  Persuasive written, oral, and interpersonal communications are essential skills that are required for success in every business discipline. In this class, students will learn how to use the tools of consultative selling to take a point of view on a business issue, support it with logic and evidence, and make a recommendation effectively in multiple media, ranging from written to verbal, and from formal to extemporaneous.