Phase 2: Management in Context

This phase is structured in three broad and overlapping learning clusters: Individual, Organisation and Environment. The following modules are delivered during this phase::

Business Finance

The aims and functions of financial management; financial analysis; management of working capital; financial markets; strategic investment and financing decisions; dividends; cost of capital, risk and required rate of return; valuation and take overs; an introduction to derivative instruments.

Business in Society

The role of business in society as it pertains to environmental, social and governance issues; discussions around the impact of business on society and the environment and vice versa; issues of management and the disclosure of the impacts through corporate governance practices.

International Management

About this module: International economics; international trade law and trade blocks; managing in the international environment; emerging economies and growth strategies.

Leadership

Personal Authentic Leadership

  • Orientation and Context: New world of leadership; global values shift; hard/transactional and soft/transformational competencies; reflection; high-performance leadership; leadership councils; personal leadership development journey.
  • Personal Leadership Edge: High-performance leadership; personal leadership style; authentic personal worldviews; applying critical leadership event reviews for development; refining own authentic leadership edge,.
  • Personal Mastery and Emotional Intelligence: History, models, application and development of emotional intelligence; relationships; stress management.
  • Individual Ethical Decision-making: Ethical dilemmas and decision-making; main ethical theories (consequence-based, rule-based, virtue ethics, social contract theory).
  • Multi-cultural Sensitivity: Understanding differences; theories of diversity management; discrimination; stereotypes; beliefs and value systems.
  • Personal Identity/Culture/History: Self-knowledge; multiple identities in the context of histories and cultures; self-awareness, self-assurance.
Leading with Others

  • Valuing and Leading Diversity: Strategies to manage diversity; diversity challenges in global and SA businesses environment; diversity as a competitive advantage, high-performance diverse teams.
  • High-impact Leadership and Teaming: Applying leadership practices; dynamics of rank and power; unleashing greater team IQ and EQ; applying roles and levels of accountability; leader as coach; tough conversations.
Leading the Organisation

  • Organisational Change: Change management; process and psychology of change; change management models; methods to lead and facilitate change; case studies.
  • Corporate Governance: Organisational integrity; King II, King III and international standards; the director's dilemma (conformance versus performance); business drivers for organisational integrity; ethics framework.
  • Diversity within Organisations: Managing diversity for organisational competitiveness; changing corporate cultures; managerial competencies and leadership styles; creating shared vision and full employee participation.
  • High-performance People Management Practices: People management strategy; HR value proposition; professionalism; HR role in creating a high-performance culture; talent management.
  • Employment Relations: Employment relationships; environmental influences; trade union dynamics; role of employers; role of the state; collective bargaining; employee participation; employment law.
  • Negotiation: Managing conflict and improving negotiation outcomes, while creating and maintaining long-term relationships.

Marketing Management

The role of marketing in society and its impact on both consumers and producers; consumerism and customer centricity and its relationship to all parts of the business; the central role of marketing in the organisation; the principles of marketing; the marketing concept and process; consumer behaviour and the concept of value; directional strategies, including segmentation, target market selection and positioning (STP); branding; marketing strategy including the traditional marketing mix (4Ps) and the expanded marketing mix (7Ps); formulation, implementation and control of a marketing plan.

Operations and Information Management

Competition and operations management of global organisations; demand management; order fulfilment process; volume and variety; e-commerce and the impact on operations, technology and productivity; operations and information quality; the global supply chain and information; the information resource; managing information technology to deliver strategy; enterprise systems; managerial decision-making and knowledge management; information strategies; technology challenges and future trends.

Strategic Management

The theory, process, implementation and evaluation of strategic management; industry, competitive, and environmental analyses in an unpredictable operating environment; internal analysis (value chain, processes, differentiation, segmentation, assessment of internal resources and capacity), goal-setting (articulating and prioritising organisational objectives and designing measurable, operational goals across the organisation), and formulating strategy (optimising value chain activities, implementing change); link between allocation of resources/budgets and strategic plan; evaluating performance using multi-dimensional tracking models such as the Balanced Scorecard and feedback loops, evaluating difficult-to-quantify, non-financial goals; designing action plans; differentiation between competitive business strategy and corporate strategy; managing stakeholders and interest groups; leadership, role of key decision-makers and specifically the role of the CEO and middle managers; entrepreneurial action-orientation; managing innovation; risk; entrepreneurial initiatives; military strategy; social enterprise and non-profit management; driving the organisation forward where the margins between private enterprise, government and the social sector are becoming increasingly blurred; integrated, cross-disciplinary cases; business simulations.

Further information

 PDF of comprehensive MBA brochure in English [Read]
 PDF of comprehensive MBA brochure in English [Print / Download]

 PDF of comprehensive MBA brochure in Afrikaans [Read]
 PDF of comprehensive MBA brochure in Afrikaans [Print / Download]

The USB reserves the right to modify the contents of subjects and to combine subject matter for better integration of learning areas. This is in the interest of continuous improvement of the curriculum.