Winter Quarter Courses
Winter quarter courses complete functional knowledge and supplement these with a leadership perspective on strategy analysis and formulation. You also choose two electives from a variety of fields. The quarter ends with a field trip to Washington, D.C. and New York for discussions with government and business leaders. A sample of courses included:
Finance
Joy Ishii
Assistant Professor of Finance
This course covers the foundations of corporate finance and uses these foundations to analyze many of the important financial decisions made within firms and other institutions. Some of the topics covered include the valuation of fixed-income securities and stocks, capital budgeting and the choice of investment projects, the optimal capital structure of the firm, leveraged buyouts, hostile takeovers, private equity financing and venture capital, and financial distress. Through cases and discussions of topical issues, the course provides an opportunity to analyze practical financial situations and problems. The course is applied, but within a rigorous theoretical framework.
Marketing Management
Wasim Azhar
Visiting Professor of Marketing
The course focuses on strategic decisions necessary to match organizational resources and objectives with market opportunities. The coursework mirrors the stages involved in developing a marketing plan: understanding the market, including consumer, competitor, and company analysis; and implementing the marketing plan, including market selection, positioning, product, price, promotion, and distribution.
Strategic Management
Robert A Burgelman
Edmund W. Littlefield Professor of Management
Director of the Stanford Executive Program; Director of the Executing Strategic Change Executive Program
Dr. Robert Pearl
CEO of The Permanente Medical Group, Kaiser Permanente
This 9-session course focuses on situations where senior executives must execute strategic action fast because of rapidly changing environmental conditions. The focus of the course is on the approaches successful leaders use to recognize the need for strategic change early, determine which particular approach is likely to be successful, and then implement the change to its conclusion. Leaders in these situations often confront the problem that many people in the organization do not yet recognize the need for change and resist making the personal adjustments required. The course provides these leaders with tools to initiate and execute the changes required to address key strategic challenges: how to capitalize better on the position an organization occupies in its environment, how to reposition the organization relative to its competitors and how to develop and implement a plan to accomplish the required changes successfully.
