Strategy

Whether you're working at a law or financial firm, advertising or insurance agency, hospital, pharmaceutical company, or other type of organization, strategy and statistics are key to an organization's overall performance. Strategy creates a vision and emphasizes resources needed for firms to develop a competitive advantage. Statistics provides the data and tools executives need to make decisions. Together, these disciplines work continuously to support the firm's long-term sustainability and growth.

At the Gabelli School, students can specialize in either field, preparing for careers as consultants, analysts, general managers, statisticians, strategy staff, and advisors.

How courses are counted

Students must note the following policy for how courses are counted. A student may count a maximum of one class in fulfilling more than one purpose—that is, toward any combination of major, minor, and primary or secondary concentration. For example, only one economics class could count toward both a finance major and an economics minor; any additional economics class would count toward the finance major OR the economics minor, but not both. Similarly, one management class could count toward both a primary concentration in management and a minor in sustainable business, but any subsequent management class would not count toward both. Any exceptions to these rules will be posted within the specific area major, minor, or concentration requirements.

SABU 2142. Statistics II. (3 Credits)

This computer-assisted course develops the student's ability to collect data, postulate a hypothesis or a model, select the appropriate statistical technique, analyze the data using statistical software, draw correct statistical inferences, and clearly summarize the findings. Specific topics include chi-square tests, analysis of variance, simple and multiple regression and correlation models, time series analysis, and quality control.

SABU 3437. ST: History of Business. (3 Credits)

This course will focus on the interrelationships between the business community and the development of the United States of America. The course is divided into three sections that will cover such topics as the colonization of America by the Europeans, industrialization in the United States and the civil war and creating an environment of business regulation.

SABU 3441. Intro Health Care Systems. (3 Credits)

This course will describe the different elements of the healthcare system and highlight the role of the payers, providers, patients, healthcare service workers and the industry (pharmaceutical, devices, supplies and diagnostics) within the context of a larger social system governed by local regulations and different demographic realities. While the emphasis will be on the United States key differences with other systems such as in Europe, Canada, Brazil and China will also be presented. The role of key associations in the US such as the AMA, IOM, PhRMA, patient advocacy groups and unions will be described. Emerging trends in the system in the United States will be presented as will the impact of other countries on the US.

Attribute: 0CST.

Prerequisites: MGBU 3223 or LPBU 3223.

SABU 3447. ST: Current Topics Healthcare. (3 Credits)

Healthcare management operates in a very dynamic environment. As healthcare policies change with new administrations so do the priorities of providers and payers. The patients feel the impact of these changes the most while the industry has to continuously re-assess the validity of its business models. Further, new technologies, scientific breakthroughs and system innovations keep healthcare administrators on their toes. This course provides an opportunity to discuss the most prevalent issues in healthcare as they are happening. Guest lecturers and professors provide their views on different challenges that the healthcare industry faces including policy, operations, risk taking and decision-making uncertainties and the developing solutions. Students will participate in these discussions and do a final paper on one of the topics of their choosing. Each formal lecture will be followed by one or two in-depth discussion sessions.

Prerequisites: MGBU 3441 or SABU 3441.

SABU 3448. Health Business Practicum. (3 Credits)

This course offers students concentrating in Healthcare Management to do an internship at an approved healthcare institution or conduct research on a specific topic at Gabelli's Global Healthcare Innovation Management Center.

Prerequisites: MGBU 3441 or SABU 3441.

SABU 3452. ST: Industry Analysis and Strategic Planning. (3 Credits)

Discusses techniques for analyzing the long-term attractiveness of different industries and develops a framework to understand the nature of competition and the relative competitive position of firms within industries. Emphasizes global factors that affect industry attractiveness and competitive positioning. In particular, highlights the impact of differences in and the competitive advantages of nations and trade, as well as the development of global standards for the long-term profit potential of industries. While this course emphasizes the industry level, it also includes competitive factors of firms within industries to introduce a framework for strategic planning at the firm level.

Attribute: 0CST.

SABU 3453. ST: Sustainability and Strategy. (3 Credits)

Sustainability has increasingly been regarded as standard business practice for corporations. Yet, many firms still struggle to integrate sustainability. In this course, we will take a strategic approach to understanding and creating solutions to corporate sustainability issues, such as climate change, managers face at present. By applying strategy tools and frameworks, this course will illustrate how firms may cope with sustainability pressure and transition toward a more sustainable way of conducting their business, while providing further insights into how sustainability challenges may be considered opportunities rather than obstacles. We will also consider sustainability-oriented value creation and business models where firms more explicitly seek sustainability as their primary goals rather than as a secondary objective. This course should be of value to students keen on developing critical thinking skills and analytical skills surrounding corporate sustainability.

Attributes: 0CST, ENT, SOIN.

SABU 3552. ST: The Rose Program. (3 Credits)

This course is intended for students who want to learn more about regulation in the financial services industry and want to get actively involved in shaping the regulatory space. Top performing project teams will present their proposals to a panel of Wall Street executives and will be invited to Washington, DC (all expenses paid) to present to regulators.

SABU 3562. ST: Singapore Global Immersion: Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Economic Development. (3 Credits)

Innovation is generally believed to be a major driver of economic growth and development as it may increase the output of an economy for a given level of input. Entrepreneurs play an important role in translating technological inventions into commercially viable innovations, thereby contributing to economic growth and development. While this account of economic development seems simple enough to understand by policy makers, countries significantly vary in terms of prosperity and economic development.

SABU 4430. ST: Machine Learning For Strategy. (3 Credits)

To achieve a competitive advantage, managers need to make certain decisions about activities along their value chains. This course tries to help students (i.e., future or current managers) understand how they can use machine learning (ML) techniques for such decisions. While ML is a vast and rapidly evolving domain, the underlying logic and concepts are well identified. Therefore, to make the best use of our time, we not only cover the current techniques and applications of ML but also its fundamental concepts rooted in statistics. This approach will give students the necessary tools to teach themselves as they enter the job market and ML evolves. Students are not expected to be expert statisticians, but a basic understanding of statistics will be helpful. A willingness to learn and explore beyond class would make a significant difference in students’ learning journeys. The course covers both the theory and application of ML using conventional lectures, lab sessions, case studies, web-service platforms (involving Amazon Web Services, Azure, etc.), and guest lectures by pioneering adopters of ML from the industry.

Attribute: 0CST.

SABU 4431. ST: Blockchain: Industry Disruptor. (3 Credits)

Blockchain (the technology underlying Bitcoin and Ethereum) is a transformative technology that will up-end existing industries and spawn completely new ones. In this course, students will study the fundamentals of blockchain and examine its potential impact on industries as diverse as banking, energy, music and non-profits.

SABU 4432. ST: Managing Innovation and Technology. (3 Credits)

This course will introduce students to theoretical and practical aspects of the crossroads between technology and innovation. The course will take students on a journey through the different stages of the entrepreneurial process of technology innovation, including converting the innovation into a business model innovation, financing, and marketing. Students will practice and develop skills that include writing a full business plan (including financials and a marketing plan), negotiations with investors, and making a presentation in a startup pitch competition.

SABU 4433. Strategic Analysis for Consultants. (3 Credits)

Entering the career path of a consultant demands particular skills—scoping and pricing projects, identifying promising markets and estimating demand, identifying data from various sources and pairing them for analysis, and so forth. This course—required for all consulting concentration and secondary concentration students at the Gabelli School—helps to bolster these skills.

SABU 4434. Measurement and Data Visualization. (3 Credits)

Consultants are interested in answering questions such as: How well is this company run? How is the company funded? How are employees spending their time? To answer these questions, they may look at company records, speak to employees and customers, or make site visits. Decisions need to be made on how to collect, summarize, analyze, and present these disparate pieces of information. In this course, we think about how to approach these issues, from developing appropriate and ethical metrics and heuristics to creating accessible visualizations.

Attribute: 0CST.

SABU 4435. ST: Judgment and Decision-Making. (3 Credits)

The purpose of this course is to make you a better decision maker both professionally and in your personal life. The course is organized around two distinct approaches to decision-making. The normative approach concerns how we should make decisions. Should I buy the cheaper car or the car with better gas mileage? Should I buy a house or rent an apartment? In the first part of this course you will learn how to structure and solve complex decision problems involving uncertainty and conflicting objectives. The descriptive approach concerns how we actually do make decisions. Why do people not save enough for retirement, or why do they invest their money irrationally? Why do entrepreneurs invest time and effort when past evidence suggests that they will most likely fail? The second part of the course will draw on research from behavioral economics and psychology in order to understand common biases and errors in judgment and decision-making, and we will learn methods for avoiding those errors in our own lives and work.

Attribute: 0CST.

SABU 4436. ST: Strategic Management and the Pharmaceutical Industry. (3 Credits)

This course will introduce students to the skills and techniques in researching highly regulated industries, using the pharmaceutical industry as an example. The industry is going through major transformations, with the basic business model being threatened. This course will analyze the reasons for this and will help in defining newly emergent business models in the pharmaceutical industry. The uncertainties created by turbulence in the political, economic, social, and techno-scientific systems will be highlighted as will the creative solutions being attempted.

SABU 4441. Strategy. (3 Credits)

This integrated course brings together the student's previous study of the functional areas of business. The course focuses on the activities of the chief executive's top management group in defining the objectives and goals of the organization and in developing programs for the achievement of those goals. Major attention is devoted to the sophisticated, contemplative action of top-level decision makers.

SABU 4444. ST: Adv Concepts In Strategy. (3 Credits)

The objective of the course will be to build upon the basic strategy skills developed during MGBU 4441. Companies are facing serious strategic challenges as the pace of technological change has increased, competitors have become more aggressive and customers have become more demanding. The course will examine advanced strategy concepts through case studies of companies at strategic crossroads, white papers and articles describing new strategy concepts and actual events occurring in the marketplace. Students will be asked to contribute to weekly lectures, take a traditional mid-term exam and participate in small teams to produce a final project. The final project will address a company at a strategic crossroads and propose a recommended course of action for that company to meet its current challenge or exploit a potential opportunity.

SABU 4456. ST: Global Corporate Communication. (3 Credits)

The ability to influence is a critical business skill for business professionals in any industry, including consulting. This course focuses on corporate communication, including both internal and external communication. It includes sessions with faculty and industry professionals. We first define corporate communication and persuasion to better understand how organizations develop long-term relationships with clients, as well as internal and external stakeholders. We will discuss how to assess corporate communication, as well as various modes of effective corporate communication. Students will demonstrate their ability to assess stakeholders and audit an organization’s communications. They will also gain experience in developing communication plans.

Attribute: 0CST.

SABU 4999. Independent Study. (1 to 3 Credits)