Compulsory core course
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Managing with Digital Technology increases technical literacy of managers and leaders. The main objective of this course is to give managers a high-level overview of the fundamental concepts, main topics and problems in computer science and information technology and how they relate to business settings, and thus equip them to make better decisions regarding applications of technology, even if they are not technologists themselves. This course takes a top-down approach and emphasises high level mastery of important concepts in computer science and information technology. Students who successfully complete this course will feel confident in any technology organisation and will have an appreciation for the problems in the field, how they affect or constrain business decisions and how it all works.
Elective courses – choose three
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Project management involves the overall planning, control and coordination of a project. It is the process by which the responsibility for all phases is combined within one multidisciplinary function. This course introduces you to the project management skills needed during the lifetime of a project. It explores some key concepts of project management, including project risk management.
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For many established businesses, the ability to identify and effectively respond to new opportunities is increasingly central to their success and, indeed, survival. Evidence suggests that innovation in a corporate context can often be difficult. In recent years, however, a growing number of organisations have drawn on approaches and practices more common to small entrepreneurial start-ups to help them identify new market opportunities and how they could respond to these opportunities. This is sometimes called ‘intrapreneurship’.
The aim of this course is to provide students with insights into the intrapreneurship process and to help them develop the skills and knowledge they need to enhance the ability of their organisations to identify new opportunities in the market and respond to them effectively. It does so by giving them hands-on experience of participating in an online corporate challenge.
One of the key aspects to successful intrapreneurship is the ability to work collaboratively across different aspects of the business, often in different locations and parts of the world. For this reason, the corporate challenge is based on group work, where students will work through an online platform to identify and develop a new business opportunity for a corporate partner.
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Evidence-based decision-making, supported by a data-driven culture, is critical to the success of organisations. It is essential that professionals can define problems clearly and systematically, know what techniques can be applied in order to solve these problems, and communicate the results concisely and effectively. This course helps students to frame business problems in a quantitative matter and learn how data collection and experimentation can help provide management insights. As the second step, students will learn how to solve problems through predictive models. This requires a basic understanding of statistics and therefore students will study the basics of regression provided by the Harvard Quantitative Methods online course during the first five weeks. This will help improve students’ data literacy in order to communicate more effectively with data scientists, as well as contribute to the democratisation of data within their business. Finally, students will learn the basics of using Tableau, one of the leading Data Analytics and Visualisation tools in the field. Through data storytelling, students will learn to communicate data more effectively and improve their ability to simplify problems and facilitate decision-making.
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In this course, students will first learn the fundamentals of innovation and technology, including the impact of technology on organisational strategy, internal and external factors influence a firm’s technology strategy, diffusion of technology and technology disruption. Students are next introduced to the stages of the entrepreneurial life cycle, categories of entrepreneurial opportunities and processes for generating new business ideas. After translating opportunities into a well-crafted plan and pitch, students will learn various financial strategies to support new business and how to design experiments using minimum viable products to test market-driven hypotheses and refine multiple aspects of the business model. Next, students will explore essential factors influencing customers to adopt new products in the current business environment and approaches to scaling businesses built on new products and services. Finally, the course concludes by analysing how startups can embed globalisation into the foundations of their ventures and looking at strategies of established firms in creating breakthrough innovations.
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The course is divided into two key themes. Weeks 1-5 focus primarily on the strategic role and organisational value of digital technologies. Weeks 6-10 focus on the strategic management of digital technologies to realise this value potential. Every week there will be a mix of readings and/or case studies that form the foundation of discussions and activities. Some written preparation in the form of a blog post is required every week to ensure students have done the pre-work necessary to engage in these class discussions, which are facilitated face-to-face or via the course forum.
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This course suits individuals looking to build their strategic abilities around entrepreneurship and the innovation associated with entrepreneurship. It provides exposure to both the fundamentals of business innovation and the practical aspects of identifying, evaluating and moving business ideas forward. The course uniquely exposes students to current ideas and thoughts from innovators, venture capital (VC) groups, and successful start-up CEOs within the Sydney ecosystem.
Two streams of entrepreneurship are covered in the course: startup creation and startup innovation. Specific methodologies covered include integrated experiences of Design Thinking and The Lean Startup.
This is an opportunity to learn about venture creation, startup resourcing, strategy and management, design and innovation involving your own startup. Entrepreneurship & Innovation is a hot topic today – many startups continue to raise money through angel investors and VCs, but the road is a challenging one.
Understanding about what makes entrepreneurship and the innovation in startups work is paramount to success. We will help you develop your confidence, your products, your pitch, and your funding to help get you started on the road to your startup success.