Course Schedule and Catalog

Long Title: PMBA LAUNCH

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 1.5

Description: The Rice MBA Program Launch is composed of a rigorous one week experience intended to help acclimate students to the Jones School Culture, as well as the rapid pace of a top-tier graduate business program. At the end of Launch, students will be better prepared academically, professionally, administratively, and culturally to reap the full benefits of the MBA experience. The Rice MBA Program Launch is a mandatory activity for all incoming students.

Long Title: FINANCIAL ACCOUNTING

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Financial statements are a key source of information about the economic activities of a firm. This course addresses the construction and interpretation of financial statements. The goal of the course is not to train you to become an accountant. Rather, the course should equip you to become an informed user of financial statement information. Because annual reports are somewhat formidable, we will study how firms present the information for various accounts in their financial statements, including the footnotes. By the end of the course, you should have a basic understanding of financial statements and the ability to use them for decision making. Fulfillment of these objectives involves acquiring several skills. The course will emphasize (i) gaining familiarity with the types of transaction firms engage in, (ii) the mapping of transactions into accounting numbers, (iii) understanding the accounting-related choices that managers have for transactions and the rationale behind the various methods, (iv) developing fluency in accounting terminology, and (v) appreciating the complexity of accounting due to the (often considerable) discretion and judgment involved in choosing among alternative accounting methods, making estimates, and disclosing information in financial statements.

Long Title: MANAGERIAL ACCOUNTING

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 1.5

Description: The course provides an introduction to accounting systems that managers use to support decision making and to align behaviors. The objective of cost management systems is to provide information about costs; including, but not limited to costs of products and services. While financial accounting requires that product cost information be accumulated in particular ways for external reporting, these approaches often provide inadequate information for managing the firm. Management accounting is distinct from financial accounting in its focus on internal (to the firm) uses of accounting and nonfinancial data and in the relative absence of external rules-making bodies such as the SEC or FASB and external monitors such as public accounting firms.

Long Title: ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 1.5

Description: Issues involving power and influence, norms and values, and incentives and rewards shape individual and group behavior in organizations. Throughout your work life, you have accrued a number of experiences and insights concerning the “human” side of management. In this course, we will discuss your experiences, evaluate and interpret them, and develop a toolkit that will further enhance your ability to make effective decisions, motivate and lead employees, and understand the processes underlying social interaction in organizations.

Long Title: ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: .75

Description: Over the course of your life you have already encountered—and will continue to encounter—the need to lead change or, at a minimum, adapt to change. Chances are good that you already do an adequate job navigating change and may have experienced satisfactory or even better-than-expected results. However, by applying frameworks that elevate your abilities beyond the “common sense” level of performance, you can markedly improve the degree and/or frequency of your success. The primary goal of this course is to help you become an effective leader of organizational change. In this very brief class, you will learn, discuss and put into action an important framework for managing organizational change. Your participation in this course will: 1) provide you with an effective framework for managing organizational change. 2) improve your competencies as both a leader and participant in change.

Long Title: MANAGERIAL ECONOMICS

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 1.5

Description: Managerial economics deals with the application of microeconomic analysis to managerial decision-making. It is therefore a very broad subject and serves as the foundation for making decisions in finance, accounting, marketing, and management/strategy.

Long Title: ECONOMIC ENVIRONMENT OF BUSINESS

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 1.5

Description: EEB stresses an understanding of the major macroeconomic forces affecting business in today’s global economy. Fluency in major macroeconomic concepts and forces enhances business decision making in the globally competitive product, financial, and labor markets that characterize the modern business environment. With this in mind, the learning objectives for the course include an understanding of 1) the key economic policy goals and how they are related: low unemployment, price stability and long-term sustainable growth; 2) the primary economic policy tools: fiscal policy and monetary policy; and 3) key economy-wide prices: inflation, interest rates, and exchange rates. Repeatable for Credit.

Long Title: FINANCE

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: The objective of this course is to introduce you to the theory and practice of corporate finance, and to provide you with a set of analytical tools necessary to answer the most important questions related to firms’ financing and investment policies. The theory of corporate finance consists of the following building blocks: Valuation, Investment Decisions, Risk and Return, Financing Decisions, Derivative Securities.

Long Title: CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: .75

Description: MGMW 560 is an interdisciplinary, interactive study of business ethics and the social responsibility of business organizations. It is not designed to dictate individual values, but to show how values can be integrated effectively in successful business decision-making. It encompasses an in-depth examination of the sorts of ethical conflicts that arise in business and an exploration of the interplay between professional and applied ethics, law and management. Emphasis is placed on consideration of stakeholder concerns and the development of personal ethical decision-making skills. Repeatable for Credit.

Long Title: BUSINESS - GOVERNMENT RELATIONS

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 1.5

Description: MGMW 561 is a study of the relationship between business and government and its impact on the formation of public policy. The course examines how business issues are influenced by: political structures and institutions, information, relationships, stakeholders, crisis, media and ethics. Students will participate in a Congressional simulation exercise and create an issue management plan that applies class lectures, readings and independent research to an issue of their choice.

Long Title: COMPETITIVE STRATEGY

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 1.5

Description: The field of strategic management explores how firms achieve competitive advantage in a dynamic and complex environment from the general manager’s perspective. This course is organized around fundamental frameworks to assist you in analyzing a wide range of strategic issues facing a firm. It will: 1) Cover theories for in-depth industry analysis, for anticipating and predicting future industry developments; 2) Examine some of the firm specific underpinnings of competitive advantage and growth in both domestic and international settings; 3) Explore some of the challenges in implementing the strategy that has been formulated. Nevertheless, the best analysis in the world will have little effect if it cannot be communicated to others. Managers must be able to articulate their views coherently and persuasively, and they must be skilled at understanding and critiquing other points of view. Management is a "verbal sport;" perhaps 90% of a typical manager's day is consumed by oral communication. Time is often scarce. You must learn to make convincing arguments and to make them quickly, or the merits of your ideas are likely to become simply irrelevant. This skill takes practice, and we will place a great deal of emphasis on it in class.

Long Title: STRATEGY FORMULATION AND IMPLEMENTATION

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 1.5

Description: The central concern of strategic management is to help companies succeed in competitive environments. Hence, the purpose of the course is to expose students to core concepts, ideas and analytical techniques that can be used to create sustainable advantage and growth in difficult competitive environments. The perspective adopted is that of a general manager who has overall responsibility for the performance of the firm as whole. To this end, the course will attempt to build students’ ability to develop, evaluate, and implement value-creating strategies at the business and corporate level. In doing so, the course will not only introduce new or advanced concepts in strategy, but also review and build upon some of the concepts students have already studied in the first core course in strategy. Given the integrative nature of strategic management, we shall attempt to establish links with important concepts that students have been exposed to in other functional areas.

Long Title: OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 1.5

Description: Introduction to the design and integration of successful operations tactics both within the organization and across the supply chain. The course focuses on understanding, managing and improving processes and flows of products, customers, and information. Touching upon bottlenecks, inventory, quality management, and strategic issues in operations.

Long Title: MARKETING

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course is built around the premise that providing superior value to customers is a central means of creating value for the firm’s stakeholders. The course focuses on marketing strategy – the strategic decision of what value to provide, how to provide it, and to whom. You will lean the importance of balancing effectiveness and efficiency through formulation, implementation, evaluation, and control of marketing mix programs directed at target segments.

Long Title: STRATEGIC BUSINESS COMMUNICATION

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture/Laboratory

Credit Hours: .75

Description: Introduction to the strategy and practice of business presentations. Includes frequent oral presentations (both individual and team) and feedback.

Long Title: DATA ANALYSIS

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: The objective of this course is to help you learn to analyze data and use methods of statistical inference in making business decisions.

Long Title: STRATEGIC BUSINESS COMMUNICATIONS II

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: .75

Description: Continued instruction in the core strategic business communication skills introduced in Strategic Business Communication I. In addition to a mandatory writing workshop, students have the opportunity to select workshops on other communication topics, based on individual needs and interests.

Long Title: ICE ILE

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Intensive Learning Experience

Credit Hours: 1.5

Description: The Ice Cream Game is a realistic, competitive game set in a Marketing Context. Student teams have a fixed budget to spend on Production and Advertising across each of three different time periods. They control: 1) How many different product types they offer (up to 4); 2) What specific raw material ingredient combinations make up those products; 3) How many units of each product type to produce; 4) What price to charge; 5) How much money to allocate to advertising (if any) for each product in each media; and, 6) How much to spend stressing each product attribute. All teams compete with each other for share, sales, and profit in a world composed of three segments which (may) differ in their preferences – thus each team’s strategy can definitely affect all the other team’s results. The game allows the student to apply what they have learned in Data Analysis, Marketing, Economics, Strategy, and Organization Behavior all in a world where both analysis and creativity are important ingredients in the recipe for success.

Long Title: SPECIAL TOPICS

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Internship/Practicum, Laboratory, Lecture, Seminar

Credit Hours: 1 TO 4

Description: Topics and credit hours vary each semester. Contact department for current semester's topic(s). Repeatable for Credit.

Long Title: 2ND YEAR IMMERSION

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Intensive Learning Experience

Credit Hours: .75

Description:  Repeatable for Credit.

Long Title: COMMUNICATIONS

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: .75

Description: In this course students will explore current topics in business communications. The course applies theory and research in business communications to everyday business communication practice. Individual sessions focus on the following issues: Internal Corporate Communications and Web 2.0; Crisis Communications; Cross-Cultural Communications; Interpersonal Communications in Business. Students will be expected to conduct research, analyze case studies, and present their findings. The course strives to teach knowledge and skills immediately applicable to solving business communication problems in the 21st century workplace. Repeatable for Credit.

Long Title: LEADERSHIP

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 1.5

Description: This course aims to develop a more thorough understanding of leadership and the leadership process. Through this exploration, it is hoped that students will come to understand themselves better within the leadership context (i.e., as a follower, as a self-leader, and as a leader of others).

Long Title: NEGOTIATIONS

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 1.5

Description: Negotiating is an important part of our everyday lives, whether we realize this or not. As research tends to show, however, most of us are often not as effective as we could be in negotiation situations. The purpose of this course is simply to improve your ability to negotiate in ways that are consistent with the demands of the situation and your own personal values. The course is designed around the premise that negotiation is a science and an art. The assigned readings are informed by the latest research on negotiations. The exercises and other learning activities were chosen to help you gain a feel for how this science informs the practice of securing agreements between interdependent parties. Repeatable for Credit.

Long Title: STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT SIMULATION

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 1.5

Description: The goal of MGMW 798: First Year Capstone Course is to deliver an applied learning educational experience that provides broad functional and foundational coverage of first year MBA core courses. In order to be successful, students must be able to demonstrate the following: (1) integrating concepts across business functional areas, (2) articulating value and solicit buy in for their plan internally and externally, and (3) demonstrating results from a strategic plan.

Long Title: CAPSTONE CONSULTING PROJECT

Department: Management

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Language of Instruction: Taught in English

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: The PMBA Capstone course is a comprehensive, real-world strategic planning course with a unique twist to challenge student teams – they work with a non-corporate, Houston-based, community organization. Students apply all of the disciplines (strategy, finance, marketing, organizational behavior, etc.) that they have learned in the program to thoroughly assess the organization’s current situation and develop a strategy, detailed functional design, business case, and implementation plan for the senior executives and board of directors at these organizations.