Decrease font Decrease font
Decrease font Decrease font
Enlarge font Enlarge font
Enlarge font Enlarge font

The core curriculum, required for all MBA-GM students, focuses on business analysis and leadership skills, analytical tools and grounding in key emerging business areas.

Core Course Descriptions

Includes:

  • Foundations: Mandatory one-week course for all incoming students covering key aspects of leadership, team building, motivation, ethics, cross-cultural communication, self-assessment and opportunities to explore career management and job search strategies. During Foundations Week, students join learning groups that interact on-and off-campus. This enhances teamwork and provides a living global experience in which you interact with students from all over the world.
  • Foundational global courses: Emphasis on business analysis and leadership skills, tools for macro-environmental analysis and grounding in important emerging business areas.
  • Thunderbird Global Experience: Two-week courses at international locations during which you meet business leaders of international organizations. You also have the opportunity to examine and discuss management problems through a local and global perspective.
  • Global Enterprise: Preparatory courses on intra-entrepreneurship, innovation and global citizenship -- key drivers in a competitive global society that relies on innovation for marketplace success.
  • Global Business Plan/Integrative Experience: An experience that allows you to use the functional knowledge and skills you've learned to develop viable business plans. If you choose not to complete a business plan, you may complete a capstone course that integrates the functional areas of business.

The complete core course list includes:

GL-2001 Foundations

All entering students begin their degree program  with this mandatory, one-week course. Foundations Week introduces tools and insights necessary for success and career effectiveness on a global scale. The course presents key aspects of leadership, team building, motivation, ethics, and cross-cultural communication. It also offers self-assessment tools and opportunities to explore career management and job search strategies. Presentation and computer skills are also a part of Foundations Week. The program's action-learning approach includes cases, exercises, simulations, group discussions, presentations, lectures and videos.

Back to top

GM-4000 Global Political Economy

This course offers an introduction to the  fundamentals of the international business environment and its three major aspects: (1) the institutional framework and policy management of international economic relations, (2) risk assessment and strategic analysis of nation-states, and (3) the operational and organizational concerns of the transnational enterprise. The purpose of the course is to provide the international manager with (a) an informed perspective on the institutions and policy processes that shape economic relations between international and national factors and among economic blocs as a foundation for further study in the Thunderbird program, and (b) the substantive base and analytical tools necessary for acquiring an informed perspective.

Back to top

GM-4100 Fundamentals of Accounting

This course introduces accrual accounting concepts including revenue recognition, matching, and asset and liability valuation.  Topics covered include the recognition and measurement of accounting events, the preparation and analysis of financial statements (balance sheet, income statement and statement of cash flows), the use of international financial statements and as introduction to intercorporate investments.

Back to top

GM-4101 Financial Accounting & External Reporting

This course covers the application of accounting  models to the measurement of assets, liabilities, and stockholders equity.  Topics covered include, marketable securities, receivable and inventory valuation, fixed and intangible assets, bonds, leases, dividends, stock buybacks, stock splits and foreign currency translation.  The emphasis of the course is on the evaluation of corporate financial reporting policy and the usefulness of financial reports for decision making.  U.S. and international accounting standards are covered.

Back to top

GM-4102 Managerial Decision Making

This course covers the development and use of  managerial accounting information, including both financial and non-financial performance measures, in making long- and short-run decisions.  Topics include cost-profit-volume analysis, cost behavior, relevant costs, job-order and processes costing, activity based cost management and the analysis of customer profitability.

Back to top

GM-4201 Fundamentals of Finance

Fundamentals of Finance will focus on the building blocks and the basic theories of Finance.  Topics addressed include:  Present value (and Net Present Value) concepts; the basics of stock and bond valuation (including the NPVGO model); capital budgeting (various tools of capital budgeting, and derivation of cash flows for capital budgeting); working capital management.

Back to top

GM-4202 Financial Management

The second module of Finance picks up where the  Fundamentals course leaves off. Topics addressed include: Portfolio theory and the Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM); Weighted Average Cost of Capital; capital structure theories (including agency/signaling theories and dividend policy); financial market efficiency and its implications.

Back to top

GM-4203 Global Financial Management

The third module of Finance examines corporate  finance issues from managerial and strategic perspectives, and extends the concepts covered in the previous two modules to cross-border settings. Topics addressed include: financial and real options; risk management; corporate valuation (domestic cross-border).

Back to top

GM-4210 Global Economics

This course investigates the nature of foreign  exchange markets and hedging instruments; international financial markets and the transmission of funds; balance of payments; alternative international monetary arrangements and institutions; and the respective adjustment mechanisms in response to fiscal and monetary policy changes.  The course also examines how countries grow successfully and the causes of economic crisis.

Back to top

GM-4300 Data Analysis

This course concentrates on a number of commonly  applied quantitative tools in everyday business which can be used to improve the quality of managerial decisions.  Topics covered include descriptive statistics, basic probability, confidence interval, simulation, sampling, hypothesis testing, regression analysis and linear programming.  Different managerial applications of these probabilistic as well as deterministic techniques in a variety of business areas will be demonstrated.  Using Microsoft Excel, SPSS, @Risk, and LINDO computer packages is emphasized throughout the course.

Back to top

GM-4319 Global Operations Management

This course provides an overview of the design,  control, and improvement of manufacturing and service productions systems.  Topics include operations strategy, product design and process selection, quality management and statistical process control, materials requirements planning, lean thinking, theory of constraints, service delivery and service quality, and global supply chain management.

Back to top

GM-4404 Global Enterprise

In global economies, entrepreneurship is the  engine of economic growth and prosperity. As emerging global leaders, it is important for you to understand the underlying principles and concepts about entrepreneurship and the entrepreneurial process. This course covers the personal characteristics and qualities of the entrepreneur, innovation, creativity, the business plan, opportunity analysis, and the role of entrepreneurship in developed and developing economies. Aspects of the family business, an important part of every economy, are also covered to provide an understanding of their role in a developed or emerging economy.

Back to top

GM-4405 Ethics & Governance

In recent years, the business world has become  increasingly sensitized to the presence of institutional governance and defining the culture of a corporation and its core values. Stated explicitly or not, these issues not only impact the reputation of the venture or corporation, but also its sustainability and financial bottom line.  As emerging global leaders, it is important for you to understand the underlying principles of this trend and its impact on the entrepreneurial process including how social responsibility and ethical values are woven into the fabric of entrepreneurial opportunity. This course provides an exploration into these basic concepts including how corporate and social organizations can act entrepreneurially and act in a socially responsible manner. The course focuses on corporate governance, stakeholder analysis and social responsibility. Participants will gain insight and practical skills for corporate organization and venturing, decision-making tools and perspectives, and models of non-profit and for-profit social enterprise.

Back to top

GM-4464 Competing Through People

This course explores the mix of organizational  practices and people that can be the basis of sustainable competitive advantage in the contemporary global business environment. Topics covered include cross-cultural issues in managing people; traditional and emerging models of organizations; organizational culture; leadership; employee skills and motivation; reward systems; and change management.

Back to top

GM-4468 Competitive Strategy

This course explores the strategic management of  the global firm. Readings, cases, group projects and discussions are used to present the analytical tools and techniques that support strategy formulation, and the related managerial skills and decision processes that foster strategy implementation in the global business environment. Topics covered include: industry analysis; competitor analysis, value chain management; competitive positioning; building core competencies; leveraging organizational resources; and corporate strategic management, including the role of alliances, mergers, and acquisitions.

Back to top

GM-4505 Global Marketing

This course provides a managerial orientation to  the topic of global marketing in todays complex, rapidly changing international business environment.  A key focus is developing competitive advantage by creating customer value.  Course participants will gain a fundamental understanding of marketing strategy and marketing analysis (i.e., customer, competitor, and company analysis) as well as an appreciation of the basic strategic issues involved in market segmentation, market targeting, and market positioning in the international arena.  The major tactics/tools used by global marketers to facilitate the management of their international marketing plans (i.e., product development, pricing strategies, marketing communications,  distribution management) are also examined.  Throughout the course, an emphasis is placed on developing skills for entering new markets and sustaining or growing current markets.

Back to top

GM-4600/4620/4640/4650/4660 Regional Business Environment

The Regional Business Environment courses deal  with the political and social context in which business activities take place. This includes consideration of eight factors that shape or reflect the operational realities of management and business, including: Patterns of historical development cover political, social and economic events and structures. Geographic environment involves human and economic geography, covering population and natural resource distributions, regional financial and trade centers, and transportation systems. Political environment includes government structure, state role, interest groups, political parties and the policy-making process. Cultural traditions cover religious traditions and socio-cultural dimensions that have a direct impact on business operations. International environment includes regional organizations, regional political and economic trends, regional peace and conflicts, and the place of the region in the global system. For economic environment, economic policies, current economy patterns, and major industries are discussed. Under legal environment, major regional trade barriers, investment policies, and intellectual property protection issues are covered. There are also discussions on major current issues.

Back to top

GM-4800 Cross-Cultural Communications

This dynamic and interactive course provides  managers with an effective framework for achieving their goals in competitive global business settings. The course will assist students to prepare for and execute time-tested strategies for achieving communication competence with persons from different cultures. It will not only examine theories of culture and communication, but will also place students in an experiential situation to gain valuable skills for overcoming obstacles in global management environments. Through use of cases, multicultural team exercises, and simulations, this course will equip the global manager with tools to solve problems and take advantage of opportunities in a multicultural world.

Back to top

GM-4801 Global Negotiations

This course will focus on the introduction of  negotiating in the global context.  Students will participate in a variety of hands on activities, such as scenario-driven discussions, case study and student-to-student negotiation.

Back to top

GM-5470 Global Strategy

This capstone course in global strategy focuses on the inherent tensions that global organizations encounter in formulating and implementing strategy such as localization v. standardization, and centralization v. decentralization.  The treatment of issues transcends the typical multi-domestic or international template to address concerns of a transnational nature.  Within framework, contemporary developments in joint ventures, strategic alliances, cross-border mergers and acquisitions, and the management of the globally diversified organization will be addressed.

Back to top

GM-5486 Global Leadership

This course provides practical insights into those factors, both external and internal, which impact leadership effectiveness. Topics covered include the achievements of leaders, characteristics of leaders, leading across cultures, leading change and relationship between leaders and followers.

Back to top

In the Accelerated Program, the accounting, finance, data analysis, Competing Through People and Competing Through Strategy courses are provided in a compressed format.  The remaining courses are the same in both programs.