List of Concentrations

Strategic Management

The strategic problems managers face are typically ambiguous and do not lend themselves readily to solutions using formulae or models. Strategic management helps understand the practical realities behind organizational decision-making. Strategic management solutions are required to answer questions such as: What products should you make? Which markets should you enter? What type of organization should you build? How should you respond to competitors’ behavior? Which operations should you outsource?

Chicago Booth emphasizes an interdisciplinary approach involving psychology, sociology, and economics to develop analytical frameworks that examine the strategic issues managers face. This three-pronged approach provides an understanding of how managers employ the formal and informal relationships that exist between firms in an industry, and devise solutions to the externally focused questions facing a company. The Strategic Management concentration builds the skills needed to formulate and implement an organization’s key strategies, the results of which will shape the structure and functioning of your firm.

COCURRICULAR ACTIVITIES
COURSE SAMPLING
FACULTY SAMPLING

COCURRICULAR ACTIVITIES
You'll have the chance to explore operations outside the classroom in numerous ways that will also allow you to build new skills, relationships and networks. These include:

Turnaround and Restructuring Group

The Turnaround and Restructuring Group provides resources to its members, and the Chicago Booth community, to enable a better understanding of the field and improve the competitive position of Chicago Booth students interested in entering turnaround and crisis management. The group sponsors an annual Turnaround and Restructuring Conference. Read about the most recent conference.

Corporate Management and Strategy

The Corporate Management and Strategy Group promotes the development of general management and strategy skills among Chicago Booth students. The group helps students develop functional and managerial skills; fosters relationships with companies and facilitate recruiting in corporate management and strategy at Chicago Booth in order to expand students' career opportunities; provides guidance and support to members throughout the recruiting process; provides a forum for students, faculty and industry to exchange leadership and management concepts.

Management Consulting Group

The Management Consulting Group is one of the most popular career choices of Chicago Booth graduates. It is committed to giving you a competitive advantage by providing comprehensive student development, extensive resources, and a wide range of networking opportunities. We strive to assist those within the Chicago Booth community to better understand the consulting industry and provide the tools and resources that are essential to help students make the most informed choices regarding consulting careers.

Risk Management Group

The Risk Management Group provides educational opportunities for its members, increases interest in risk management among students and attracts recruiters offering positions in risk management. The RMG also pursues events and activities aimed at building strong ties with both business leaders and Chicago Booth faculty.

COURSE SAMPLING
You’ll have the option of taking courses that address your individual career choices. Samples include:

Competitive Strategy

This course applies tools from microeconomics and industrial organization to competitive decision making. First you will learn to understand industry economics and the individual position of a particular firm, taking the industry economics as given. Next you will study issues related to both the vertical and horizontal scopes of firms. The third part introduces basic game theory which is used to analyze issues such as bargaining power, price competition, entry and exit decisions, standard setting and technological competition.

The Strategy Symposium

A group of about 30 students meet faculty, visiting business executives and others to explore approaches, ideas and questions about strategy in greater depth. The goals are to develop a better understanding of the methods and techniques of strategic thinking and to explore the design, implementation and evaluation of strategy. The development of tools and concepts for evaluating strategies both before and after the outcome is known and to seek insights that will improve the process of designing strategy are important.

Strategic Investment Decisions

This course integrates advanced analytical techniques with intuitive economic (strategic) analysis with an eye on how organizations really make decisions. You will learn to develop and apply a variety of tools to achieve greater understanding and sophistication in all aspects of the processes by which companies make strategic investment decisions. The main goal will be for students to learn to use option pricing, dynamic programming, decision trees, simulation techniques, scenario analysis and game theory to value investment opportunities. The focus will be to both incorporate the value from flexibility, delay, strategic responses, and learning into the analysis and to develop the tools to model and evaluate the full range of environmental and strategic uncertainty that companies face. We will also study the organizational processes required for effective strategic investment decisions and resource allocation. Among the issues we will discuss are decentralization/centralization, incentives, measurement, and communication processes.

Taking Charge

Taught by former C-level executives, this course focuses on the practical, current, key issues with which general managers often deal when they take over a new assignment. These include: joining a company from the outside to take charge of a subsidiary in need of change; implementing your game plan and choosing your management style; the importance of self-awareness and communications in managing others effectively; making decisions and setting priorities in a turnaround-around situation; and transitioning a very successful startup to a large corporation - without losing its distinctive culture.

Technology Strategy

This course focuses on strategic decision making in technology intensive industries. You will learn about a set of conceptual models that help determine which technologies to invest in, when to make the investments, how to capture value from the technology investment, and how to anticipate and respond to competitors and customers. Particular emphasis will be placed on building models for making strategic decisions in the context of significant technology, demand, and competitive uncertainty.

FACULTY SAMPLING
You’ll study with professors who conduct groundbreaking research, collaborate with the entrepreneurial and private equity communities, and bring their own entrepreneurial experiences into the classroom.

	Ronald S. Burt, studies the social structure of competitive advantage in careers, organizations, and markets. Burt is the author of six books, two software programs, and numerous articles and chapters in academic works.		Damon J. Phillips, studies social structural approaches to labor and product markets, organizational strategy and structure, as well as social network theory and analysis. His research has led to advancements in both the understanding of labor markets and entrepreneurship, and incorporates these advancements into his classes on management and strategic leadership.
	Harry L. Davis, studies leadership, strategy, creativity and innovation. He developed the first core leadership program of any top-rated MBA program in the country and also pioneered the Management Lab.		James E. Schrager, completed the first IPO of a U.S. private company in Japan, and has turned around several businesses, including a company with $500 million in sales and operations in 20 countries.
	Robert H. Gertner, focuses his research primarily on industrial organization, resource allocation and decision making in organizations, corporate investment, law and economics, and strategic pricing.		Ram Shivakumar, specializes in industrial organization, financial economics, and corporate strategy. Shivakumar works with entrepreneurs & corporations in the US & India on issues related to business strategy & planning. He also provides expert advice in legal disputes on matters pertaining to securities fraud, antitrust, and intellectual property rights infringement.
	Marc Knez, has evolved his research from a focus on applying game and decision theory to strategic decision-making to a focus on market analysis, strategy development, and organizational structure. His work has appeared in the Harvard Business Review, the Journal of Business, and the Journal of Labor Economics.