Master in Management & Strategy

The Bridge to Business kicks off before the program starts and is crafted to level the playing field for all participants, regardless of their academic or professional background, by covering essential basics. This approach blends flexible online asynchronous learning with face-to-face interactions and assessments, ensuring thorough preparation for the experience ahead.

The immersive simulation experience of our program begins with an essential Onboarding period. This 3-week-long phase is crafted to replicate the authentic challenges professionals encounter when embarking on their careers at top companies, ensuring you are fully equipped to navigate the complexities of the business world with confidence.

During this period, you’ll immerse yourself in a worklike environment, leveraging your existing expertise while quickly familiarizing yourself with all the tools, resources, and support. Experience lifelike scenarios reflective of real work environments, including collaborative problem-solving with teams, navigating authentic team dynamics encountered in professional settings, and engaging in simulated market competition against other companies. No need to worry if you feel lost – we’ve got your back, guiding you every step of the way to ensure you hit the ground running.

During this phase of the business simulation in the program, you’ll be designated to various “departments,” each representing different core classes. Within these departments, you’ll sharpen and refine your foundational skills across a spectrum of functional areas crucial to any company, including strategy, finance, marketing, operations, IT, and HR.

Upon entering a classroom, you’ll engage in role-playing, assuming the role of a specific department member. Through this immersive experience, you’ll delve into the fundamentals of the department while addressing real-life challenges customized to its domain. You will work in teams, mirroring how real company departments operate, with your professor serving as Department Director, guiding you through learning and practical application. While mastering fundamental concepts and applying them to real company cases, which evolve weekly, you’ll also collaborate with your team to address ongoing departmental issues. 

Now, let’s zero in on your passions and align them precisely with the career trajectory you envision. It’s time to tailor your journey to reflect your unique aspirations and ambitions through one of our 2 Specializations:

• Finance, Investments & Technology
• Strategy, Transformation & Technology

Each Specialization comprises a series of specialized courses, all essential for your chosen area of focus. If you wish to deepen your specialization beyond these courses, you are free to do so during the free electives period toward the end of the program.

The internship isn’t just a box to check—it’s the heart of the Master in Management & Strategy, bringing the business simulation to life. Here, you’ll step into the real world, applying everything you’ve learned, comparing strategies, and soaking up valuable insights from a genuine company. It’s where theory meets practice and your business toolkit gets a serious upgrade!

You’ll receive comprehensive support and guidance, with access to our extensive network of partnership agreements, providing a solid platform from which to launch your internship search. However, the ultimate responsibility for landing your ideal internship lies with you. Success will depend on your ability to identify the right opportunities, impressing recruiters, putting in the work and navigate the hiring process effectively, which will ultimately be in the hands of the recruiter. So, ensure you’re well-prepared to make the most of this unique experience!

Prepare for self-discovery and professional growth in our Global Immersion Month as you embark on an enriching journey led by a diverse team of industry experts. Explore two distinct cities, each offering a week of immersive classes with academic partners followed by a week of insightful company visits to understand the local business landscape. You’ll expand your comfort zone and gain invaluable leadership insights while seizing recruitment opportunities with top-tier companies.

Welcome to the immersive Strategy Challenge, where you’ll assume the role of a department head within a simulated company operating in a dynamic market environment. Over a condensed timeframe of three months, you and your team will navigate real-world challenges and opportunities across various sectors such as Manufacturing/Operations, Finance, HR, Marketing & Sales, or IT. Collaborating with teammates, you will be assigned a real-life business role in line with your interests and capabilities, reporting to the CEO – an industry veteran who will act both as your CEO, direct line manager and mentor. Real Leadership exposure cannot get more real than that. You will review and set targets through an updated Personal Development Plan, which will include both business targets, as well as personal development ones. Throughout this journey, you’ll compete with teams from your program, leveraging advanced business simulation software to gain a comprehensive understanding of corporate dynamics. 

As the pinnacle of the Strategy Challenge, the Capstone Project tasks you with devising and implementing a robust business plan amidst uncertainty and fierce competition. Employing skills in risk management and contingency planning, you’ll lead your simulated company to success, all while being evaluated on the quality of your deliverables and the efficacy of your decisions. Concluding with a presentation to a simulated Board of Directors, this experience fosters not just learning but the development of leadership skills essential for real-world success. 

Customize your learning journey with the opportunity of choosing from over 50 electives, covering a wide range of topics and disciplines, that will help you deepen your knowledge and skills in the areas that matter most for your career goals. Whether you want to enhance your existing expertise or develop cross-functional competencies, you will find the electives that suit your needs and interests. You will always count on the guidance and inspiration of your faculty, who will act as your Corporate Mentors in the program. They will help you focus on what’s important, identify your strengths and areas of improvement, and support you in achieving your career goals.

You will get the opportunity start applying what you learn in your electives, as well as what you learned before, in the Strategy Challenge. 

Step into a comprehensive career exploration journey with the Career Discovery Accelerator, an essential component of your Master in Management experience, which has been meticulously crafted to guide you in in clarifying your career trajectory. It empowers you to make well-informed decisions regarding your concentration, electives, and, ultimately, the roles and organizations you aim to pursue in your professional journey. 

Within this accelerator, you’ll find two pivotal elements: Career Success and Career Week. Career Success brings together industry experts, recruiters, alumni, and education providers to offer specialized guidance tailored to your career journey. Through personalized advising sessions, market insights, and employer relations activities, you’ll cultivate foundational skills essential for your professional growth. During Career Week, you’ll engage in immersive workshops and connect with over 130 international recruiters at the IE Career Forum. This hands-on experience allows you to enhance self-awareness, develop a career strategy, craft a compelling personal brand, and master various interview formats. 

The Career Discovery Accelerator’s goal is to ensure you’re equipped with the insights and strategies needed to make informed decisions about your future career path.

Seamlessly integrated into your academic journey, the Impact Skills Accelerator is an essential ingredient of the Master in Management & Strategy. It aims to sharpen a unique set of impact skills through immersive training, equipping you with essential tools for effective problem-solving, critical thinking, active listening, rapid learning, communication, negotiation, collaboration, persuasion, self-awareness, and leadership, all integrated seamlessly into your coursework and projects for practical application and enhancement.

Embedded within the Accelerator is a specialized emphasis on productivity and AI, featuring cutting-edge tools in generative AI like ChatGPT, Anthropic, Bard, Gemini, YOU, Synthesial, Copilot, and Midjourney. These tools are curated to significantly enhance productivity across various tasks such as document summarization, knowledge gathering, document creation, PowerPoint presentation automation, and Excel file analysis, particularly for roles like financial analysts, consulting analysts, marketers, and entrepreneurs. Additionally, you’ll master the utilization of custom LLMs through APIs, ensuring comprehensive proficiency in AI-driven efficiency.