Program Curriculum

StudyingThe Leadership EMBA in China curriculum is focused on innovation and leadership across borders – with a particular emphasis on the business in China and Asia. Our program is also differentiated by its focus on individual coaching for the participants – how they can improve as individuals to lead and innovate in today’s global markets.

The Smith School has become one of the world's leading business schools in transforming its curriculum to reflect the changing leadership needs for the 21st century economy. The Smith School's world-class MBA core courses constitute the foundation of the program. The core courses are supplemented with advanced courses that are designed to meet the needs of the Chinese Executive MBA participants.

The opportunity to collaborate with other members of Smith's international community - including the international trip to attend a capstone course held at Smith's main campus just outside of Washington, D.C. - further enhances the learning experience and coursework.

Program Foundation: The Core Business Disciplines

At Smith, our curriculum is based on a strong foundation in each business discipline. Throughout this coursework, we look for interactions, interdependencies, and systemic links between the disciplines and functions of a business. Foundation courses will include:

Accounting for Senior Management
This course offers an overview of financial accounting, periodic financial statements and the financial reporting process. Introduction to cost accounting concepts that play a role in preparation of financial statements. Importance of financial statements as information source for creditors and investors and as a means by which managers can communicate information about their firms.

Human Capital and Global Leadership
This course is based on the assumption that executives already have experience with leadership issues. The course will build on that background to extend executives' theoretical knowledge and applied skills. Executives will gain a stronger understanding and skill set to excel in leadership positions today.

Data Models and Decisions
This course introduces participants to contemporary techniques for arriving at optimal managerial decisions. The course draws on fundamental ideas that were originally developed in the fields of statistics and operations research, and demonstrates their application in modern business decision-making.

Global Business Environments
Participants in this course are introduced to contemporary techniques for arriving at optimal managerial decisions. The course draws on fundamental ideas that were originally developed in the fields of statistics and operations research, and demonstrates their application in modern business decision-making.

Financial Management
This course offers tools for analysis of major corporate financial decisions using a market-oriented framework. Topics include capital budgeting, security portfolio theory, operation and efficiency of financial markets, options pricing, financing decisions, capital structure, payout policy and international finance.

Marketing Strategy
For the seasoned manager, this course focuses on the design, implementation and evaluation of business-level marketing strategies and identifies their implications for product or service development, pricing, distribution, and marketing communications. Current marketing theories, concepts, and tools will be organized around a competitive, team-based, marketing strategy simulation game.

Competition, Strategy and Globalization
This is an integrative strategic management course focusing on strategy formulation and implementation in domestic and global settings. Topics include: industry and competitor analysis, industry and firm value chain, coherence in overall and functional strategies, developing global strategies, leadership, goal setting, organizational structure, and culture. The course utilizes case studies from a variety of settings and emphasizes the evaluation and selection of strategic choices.

Corporate Social Responsibility
This course will explore the following topics; Recognize the scope of managerial agency and the economic, legal and ethical responsibilities to various stakeholders, Conduct elementary ethical analyses of managerial situations using the principal schools of ethical reasoning, Identify the economic and ethical properties of a market mechanism, and the means for addressing the limitations of a market, and Recognize ethical leadership as the exercise of managerial agency in changing existing values and practices.

Supply Chain Management
Supply chain and logistics management are integrated approaches to managing the total flow of a distribution channel from supplier to ultimate customer. In this course, students are introduced to the concept of value-driven supply chains and its integration with operations

Operations Management
This course examines the strategic role that the operations function can play, and offers tools and techniques that the firm can use for strategy execution. Concepts of operations management applied to both manufacturing and services are divided into two broad areas. The first area includes operations strategy, process analysis and design, which include analysis of process flows and bottlenecks, waiting line models, total quality management and six-sigma. The second is supply-chain management, which includes forecasting, lean operations and JIT, revenue management, and advanced topics in inventory management.

Strategic and Transformational IT
This course is targeted at managers interested in developing their project management skills. The course reviews the fundamental concepts for managing organizational projects. Both technical and managerial issues will be covered.

Capstone Course
This course, held in College Park, Maryland USA will provide students with the opportunity to learn about the US business environment first-hand in a week-long experiential session that combines classroom lectures and exercises with site visits to Washington, DC government offices, as well as leading international companies in the area.

Program Advanced Courses
Additional course topics likely included from the list below

Cross Cultural Management
This course provides both scholarly knowledge and practical focus on cross-cultural management for working in a global economy. The first half of the course focuses on how international cultures vary, with emphasis on understanding U.S. corporate culture and its relationship to Chinese business practices, and how culture influences basic psychological and communication processes. The second half of the course focuses on practical implications of culture's influence in negotiation, teams and group decision making, and public relations and human resource practices.

Global Entrepreneurship and Innovation
This course explores the process of creating new ventures, including evaluating the entrepreneurial team, the opportunity and the financing requirements. Topics covered include the skills, concepts, mental attitudes and knowledge relevant for starting a new business.

International Marketing
Environmental, organizational, and financial aspects of international marketing as well as problems of marketing research, pricing, channels of distribution, product policy, and communications which face U.S. firms trading with foreign firms or which face foreign firms in their operation are covered in this course.

Implementing Strategy
This course helps participants understand the challenges of converting strategic intentions into reality. Drawing upon a combination of case studies, real life examples, conceptual frameworks and models and independent research projects, managers will learn to recognize and think through organizational issues that are often critical in determining business success.