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MBA - General Management
Dissertation
Programme Objectives
The programme has the following aims:
- To enable the advanced study of organisations, their management and the changing external context in which they operate
- Equip individuals for and/or development of a career in business and management by developing skills at a professional or equivalent level to assume senior managerial and leadership positions in business
- Development of the ability to apply knowledge and understanding of business and management to complex issues, both systematically and creatively, to improve business and management leadership and practice.
- Enhancement of lifelong learning and personal development so as to be able to work with self-direction and originality and to contribute to business and society at large.
Benefits
At the end of the programme the successful student will have the ability to:
- Demonstrate critical understanding of management theories, current issues of management, the development of conceptual frameworks to guide their application within organisations.
- Acquire a strong foundation in key functional areas of business management to enable them to succeed as effective managers/leaders in an increasingly complex and dynamic environment.
- Acquire and use a range of concepts, tools and techniques for problem solving and decision-making for analyzing complex and inter-related business scenarios.
- Demonstrate and apply independent research and critical skills enabling the investigation and evaluation of valid and relevant management issues and practices.
- Demonstrate initiative, insight, attitudes of responsibility and ethical leadership in the development of the strategic management agenda in the organization the participant works in or expected to work in the future.
Programme Content
Overview
| No. of Credits: | 30 ECTS |
| Credit Level: | Master Mandatory |
| Pre-requisite: | Completed 8 or More Modules |
| Co-requisite: | None |
| Module Description | To plan, research and write up a project that improves understanding of a significant managerial, business or organisational issues, and provide appropriate recommendations for action or findings upon which action can be determined. The Dissertation should enable students to:
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Learning Outcomes
On completion of this module, students will be able to:
- Define the objectives of a Dissertation and plan a valid and practicable project to meet the objectives.
- Carry out a critical literature review that provides a structure and focus for the Dissertation.
- Define concepts and structure them in ways that give a useful theoretical shape to the Dissertation.
- Design and apply appropriate research methods and analyse the research material systematically and critically based on both primary and secondary date collected.
- Frame, and argue for, a clear thesis in the documents and draw sound conclusions and recommendations.
- Write a clearly structured, adequately expressed and well-presented Dissertation using the prescribed style and format.
Indicative Content / Areas of Study
- Choosing a topic and designing the project
- Identifying a topic
- Drafting research objectives
- Planning the research and the project
- Analysing the literature and writing a critical literature review
- Searching the literature
- Summarising and précising the literature
- Evaluating key concepts and theories
- Developing conceptual or theoretical frameworks
- Defining concepts
- Drafting conceptual or theoretical frameworks
- Theorising the material
- Collecting and analysing research material
- Choosing and designing research methods
- Conducting the research
- Analysing, sorting and classifying the material
- Interpreting research material and drawing conclusions
- Honesty of argument and language
- Interpreting research material
- Drawing safe conclusions
- Making appropriate recommendations
- Forming arguments and writing up the Dissertation
- Arguing a thesis as well as writing a Dissertation
- Structuring the Dissertation
- Style and presentation specifications
Teaching and Learning Strategy
| Seminar/workshop: | 18 hours |
| Individual supervision: | 15-18 hours per student |
| Independent research: | 284 hours |
| Total: | 320 hours |
Assessment:
Assessment Weighting: 100%CW with a word count of between a minimum of 10,000 to a maximum of 15,000 words. Prior to the commencement of the Dissertation, the student must attend the Research Method workshop and then submit the Research Proposal for approval by the designated Project Supervisor.
The Dissertation/ Research Proposal should address the following:
- The working Title of your Independent Study (max 12 words).
- A short summary of the Research objectives, introducing the key hypotheses to be investigated (max 150 words).
- The background to your interest in the topic. Why you are investigating this topic, what has led you to your hypotheses and why it is important (max 200 words).
- The methodology you are considering – how you intend to research the topic what type of data is required to address the issues, where will it come from, how you will gather it and what are the implications. For example, access to the data sources and additional expertise you need to gather it (max 350 words).
- Preliminary Literature review of the research area and its related theories and concepts (max 500 words).
- Outline of chapters / structure planned to be adopted and what will be the focus / content of each (max 150 words).
- Details of the timeframe in which you are working and identifying key tasks and time scale in which they have to be completed (max 150 words).
Resources
Course Materials provided by IPE - PARIS
- Mark N. K. Saunders, Philip Lewis, Adrian Thornhill 6th Edition,2011, Research Methods for Business Students, Pearson Education
- Elyane Ng & Wilson Croakes, Business Research, 2013 Kogan Page.
- Online resources on Online Learning Portal
- Online data bases from IPE - PARIS E Library
Regulations: Conforms to the relevant PG regulatory framework at IPE - PARIS.
