Full-time MBA Block 4: Knowledge and Policy

Responsibility and Sustainability in Business

The aim of this module is to equip you with a comprehensive understanding of the social responsibilities of a modern business organisation. This module provides a framework to address the complex issues of responsibility and sustainability in a systematic way.

The purpose of this module is to examine how corporations and managers can respond to these challenges. Among the issues to be addressed are:

• What are the main approaches to understanding the responsibilities of the firms?
• For what social impacts (if any) should companies be held responsible?
• How can companies learn to anticipate and better manage challenges to their social, environmental and ethical performance?
• How can managers and entrepreneurs develop more inclusive or sustainable business models?
• What are the central challenges to better Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) measurement, accountability and investing?

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Corporate Finance

In this module you will examine the long-term financial decisions taken by companies. The component starts by defining the various financial instruments which firms use in their long-term financing and then addresses questions such as: How to compute the cost of capital, how debt and equity are issued; how much debt should a company use; does dividend policy matter; and why mergers and acquisitions occur. The component is also concerned with corporate control as operations of financial institutions in monitoring and controlling corporations are considered to be as important as their function in funding.

Learning outcomes:

• Corporate financial decisions, the role of financial manager and the value of the firm
• The classical objective function.
• Sources of long-term financing
• Debt financing.
• How companies raise equity.
• The cost of capital
• General models of risk and return.
• Capital structure

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Digital Technologies and Business Innovation

The Digital Technologies and Business Innovation component of this module explores the impact of new powerful digital technologies on the way businesses are organized and compete.

Learning outcomes:

• How developments in digital technologies are altering organizational processes and the business model across several industries
• Rapidly evolving opportunities and challenges, including the ethical issues that organizations and managers face when confronted with these developments
• Managerial knowledge and skills necessary to deal effectively with these opportunities and challenges in the evolving digital landscape
• Integrating business and technology
• Digital technologies and business processes
• Digital technologies and knowledge processes
• Digital business models
• Big data and analytics
• Frontiers of sourcing

The module relies on a combination of lectures, case discussions and Special Interest Groups in which participants research emerging topics and demonstrate how they will impact industries and the organizations operating in them in the near future.