Core modules
"Not only has the Lancaster MBA provided me with technical knowledge of business issues but its practical approach has helped me immensely."
Roxanne D'Souza
MBA, 2007
The core modules in the first two terms of the Lancaster MBA give you the building blocks for your later elective and project work.
Autumn Term
These first term modules provide essential knowledge and skills in areas which may be entirely new to you, or a welcome refresher in more familiar areas.
Accounting – provides the fundamental principles of financial accounting to enable you to analyse published financial statements, including balance sheets, profit and loss accounts, funds flows and group accounts.
Finance – takes a practical look at the basics of corporate financial management. It covers issues such as cash budgeting and financial planning, stakeholder value, investment appraisal, raising capital, risks and returns, capital structures, leasing analysis, mergers and acquisitions and the management of working capital.
Marketing – the marketing framework as a way of discovering and meeting customer needs. Introduces consumer behaviour, marketing research, products, distribution channels, promotion, pricing decisions and marketing programming.
Operations Management – shows how properly managed operations can be a source of competitive advantage. This module covers issues relevant to both manufacturing and service companies, including their strategic impact.
Organisational Behaviour and its Applications – factors underlying people's behaviour in organisations based on research into organisations drawn from the fields of psychology, sociology and anthropology.
The Mindful Manager – focuses on the process of management and aims to build the skills, self-awareness and teamwork competence needed to perform effectively as a manager at the most senior levels.
New Venture Challenge – over a ten-week period you will work in a team with a start-up company to produce a business plan for the company, researching the market, developing a marketing strategy and considering how the business might be organised and financed in the future. It allows you to take an early integrated view of all aspects of business, practise project management skills and understand the particular challenges facing small businesses.
"The Lancaster MBA gave us ample opportunity to meet external visitors from industry and to learn a second side to business through developing social skills."
Brian Goold
Full-time MBA, 2008
Spring Term
The core modules in the second term take an increasingly strategic focus. The Mindful Manager module is continued throughout this term.
Strategic Management – strategy is at the core of any MBA, and this module takes both an analytical and practical perspective on strategy development.
Managing IT in Organisations – provides a broad but critical introduction to IT and its relevance to modern organisations, looking at how IT can be used to support and create strategic choices.
Business Economics – serves as an introduction to the economist's view of competitive and co-operative behaviour. You will be introduced to consumption and production theory, market forces, the dynamics of business growth and multinational enterprises.
Global Society and Responsible Management – explores the ethical, social, developmental and ecological implications of international management strategies.
The Consultancy Challenge – in this four-week module you are introduced to various consultancy skills and conceptual thinking tools. You then work in teams on client-based projects, analysing a problem situation faced by the organisation and making recommendations as to how that situation could be managed.
Leading Change – requires you to re-examine the recommendations made to your client in your Consultancy Challenge report and to understand how implementation might follow.
International Business in Context – here you leave Lancaster and the UK on an intensive one-week study tour to an unfamiliar emerging economy, where you can experience for yourself the challenges and opportunities such economies present for businesses. (Costs for the visit are included within the programme fee.)
