Action Learning

• QST AC 431: Action Learning Lab: Sustainability Reporting
  Pre-requisite: QSTAC 221 and QSTXP 298; or QSTFE 323, QSTMK 323, QSTOM 323 and QSTQM 323. - The course addresses sustainability reporting and is organized into three modules. The first module focuses on the main frameworks for such disclosure, including the Task Force for Climate-Related Financial Disclosures, Sustainability Accounting Standards, the Global Reporting Initiative, Integrated Reporting, and International Sustainability Standards. 2. Module Two offers an in-depth exploration of the individual environmental, social, and governance (ESG) subjects. The third module discusses current topics such as rating agencies, external assurance, ESG scores, and ESG Activism.
• QST HM 840: Health Sector Consulting
  This is an applied consulting project course that aims to develop reflexive practitioners who can elicit client requirements, translate requirements into a problem statement and develop actionable solutions that meet client needs. The course uses a mix of case studies, individual memos and team project deliverables to systematically apply skills developed over the course of the MBA to solve real-world health sector problems. Students work on the consulting assignment in teams of up to four students based on having a shared interest in a prospective consulting project. These projects are curated in partnership with sponsor organizations to be executable within the framework of an academic semester. Projects in the past have ranged from improving the departmental revenue cycle within an academic medical center, developing an international pricing strategy for the introduction of a new product by a pharmaceutical company, to improving safety culture at a large hospital. These projects all have active involvement of the project sponsors who provide access to their organizations and provide ongoing feedback over the lifecycle of the consulting engagement.
• QST IS 474: Action Learning Lab: Platform Strategies
  Prerequisites: QSTIS 223 and QSTXP 298; or QSTIS 223, QSTFE 323, QSTMK 323, QSTOM 323 and QSTQM 323. - The world's most valuable companies—Alibaba, Amazon, Apple, Google, Meta, Microsoft, Uber—don't sell standalone products. They build platforms connecting multiple customer groups, harnessing network effects to create exponential value. This course teaches students how platforms work, why they're powerful yet hard to build, and how to design, launch, and scale them successfully. Through frameworks, economic models, and case studies spanning Airbnb to TikTok, students will tackle critical questions: How should platforms price when traditional models fail? When should they open versus close their architectures? How much responsibility should they take for harmful content? Can AI and blockchain reshape platform power? The centerpiece is a hands-on consulting project with a real sponsoring company. Past clients include Cisco, eBay, Haier, Mahindra, Pearson, SAP, Siemens, and the U.S. Postal Service. Students conduct stakeholder interviews and deliver strategic recommendations. Previous teams have been hired by clients and secured startup funding for their proposals.
• QST IS 827: Platform Strategy and Design
  Managers, entrepreneurs, and investors need mastery of platform business models to thrive in the modern economy. Today's most powerful firms—Airbnb, Amazon, Salesforce, Tencent—operate as platforms connecting buyers and sellers, users and advertisers, developers and consumers, deriving value from network effects and orchestrated ecosystem innovation. This rigorous course combines advanced theory from industrial economics, market design, and game theory with practical application. Students will develop expertise in platform design, pricing strategy, governance, competitive dynamics, and regulatory challenges through case studies spanning social media, enterprise software, healthcare, and emerging technologies including AI, blockchain, and Web3. The signature element is an intensive consulting engagement with a sponsoring organization. Past clients include Airbnb, Allstate, BASF, edX, IBM, Microsoft, PTC, and Thomson Reuters. Teams conduct stakeholder interviews and produce comprehensive 25-35 page strategic blueprints with executive presentations. Projects have resulted in direct hiring, million-dollar budget allocations, and new venture launches. This class prepares students for careers in strategy, technology, entrepreneurship, venture capital, or any industry competing with or transforming to platforms.
• QST MK 447: Action Learning Lab: Marketing Insights
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: (QSTMK 223 previously and QSTXP 298 previously or concurrently), or QSTMK 323 - Required for Marketing concentrators. Introduces tools and techniques of marketing research as an aid to marketing decision making. Definition of research problems, selection of research methodologies, design of research projects, interpretation of research results, and translation of research results into action.
• QST MK 854: Brand Management
  Graduate Prerequisites: (QSTMK723 OR QSTMK724) - This is a course about branding, and the ways that brands acquire and sustain value in the marketplace. Cases, readings, in-class discussions, and team/individual assignments are designed to provide: An appreciation of the strategic discipline of branding and its role in creating shareholder value; an understanding of brands as co-creations of consumers, marketers, and cultures, and brand management as a collaborative process of meaning management; a sound foundation in consumer-brand behavior to inform brand decisions; and a capacity to think creatively and precisely about the strategies and tactics involved in building, leveraging, defending, and sustaining strong brands. Select topics may include brand equity, brand (re)positioning, brand relationships, brand loyalty, brand community, open source branding, branded entertainment and other cultural branding strategies, internal branding, brand architecture design and portfolio strategy, brand leverage and extensions, brand metrics, crisis management, and brand stewardship. Guest speakers from branding services, consulting, and practice provide insights throughout the course. While this course has obvious relevance for those contemplating brand management careers in product or service markets, it is appropriate for a range of future professionals within for-profit and not-for-profit C2C and B2B worlds, and others who share a simple passion for branding.
• QST OM 365: Action Learning Lab: Improving Business Processes
  Pre-requisites: QSTBA 221 (or equivalent) and QSTXP 298; or QSTOM 323. Questrom BSBA students only. Course description TBD
• QST SI 360: Action Learning Lab: Strategy Consulting
  Pre-requisites: QSTFE 323 or QSTXP 298. - This course is a project-focused experiential course. The overarching goal is to provide students with an authentic look at what it is like to be an "associate consultant" inside a top consulting firm, an experience which also includes training on Strategy content elements. Course activities include a live project, introduction of relevant Strategy content, development of a "consulting toolkit," and an introduction to and perspectives on careers in consulting through talks with alumni guest speakers.
• QST SI 859: Strategy Implementation
  Graduate Prerequisites: QST FE712 or FE722, QST MK723 or MK724, QST OM725 or OM726 - Gain the skills and know-how to manage up and across your organization, passing the normal organizational tests along the way from technical expert to cross-functional integrator to directing the future course of your organization. This is strategy implementation for the middle manager who needs to 1) size-up the situation and 2) determine how to gain the power needed to achieve their objectives. One of the qualitative factors that will be explored in great detail is personal style choice vis a vis different stakeholders and organizational politics and the resultant perceptions of you and your programs. Students will study both successful and less-successful managers through cases and readings, honing their own, personal managerial style.
• QST SI 860: Managing Corporate Innovation
  Graduate Prerequisites: QST SI750 or SI751 recommended but not required - This course will give students an understanding of the challenges of undertaking innovation within an existing corporate organization or other large institution such as governments or universities. Established industries are being disrupted by innovative products and services at an increasingly fast pace. Corporate leaders are confronting a dynamic shift from formal stage gate innovation approaches toward more entrepreneurial, iterative, fast-paced innovation processes such as agile development, design thinking, lean startup, rapid prototyping, and the business model canvas. To deliver innovative results, corporations must bridge ideas generated in the labs of tomorrow with current operations. This course aims to accelerate learning on corporate innovation by examining how corporate innovators can stay nimble and enable smart experimentation without risking the competencies that made them great. As the need to innovate becomes a matter of "life and death," how do large organizations successfully innovate' We will examine how techniques and frameworks developed in the startup world are being adapted for the corporate one and how established organizations select from a portfolio of options to foster innovation. 3 cr.