Course Topics
List of topics covered • Classification of Business Administration/Management Introduces the core domains of strategy, operations, marketing, finance, accounting, HR—and how they interlock to create value. Emphasis is placed on decision rights and processes. Where does your role sit in the value chain—and how do you align functions toward a single goal? • The Economic System: Markets, Goods, Competition, Value Explains how markets coordinate scarcity via prices, how competition shapes margins, and how firms create and capture value. Covers demand, supply, externalities, and network effects with managerial implications. Are you creating value or merely moving it around? • Organization Theories: Roles of Firms, Entrepreneurs, and Other Organizations Surveys foundational lenses—transaction costs, resource-based view, stakeholder and institutional theory—to explain why organizations exist and how they behave. Which theory best explains your organization’s edge—and its blind spots? • Strategic Management: Environment, Competition, and the Strategy Process Equips participants with PESTEL and industry analysis, competitor mapping, capability assessment (e.g., VRIO), and the end-to-end strategy cycle from diagnosis to execution. Stresses coherence between choices, capabilities, and control systems. What few choices will change everything and how will you make them stick? • Marketing Principles and Market-Oriented Management Covers segmentation, targeting, positioning, and the levers of the marketing mix to build defensible value propositions. Highlights customer insight, experimentation, and lifetime value as anchors of market orientation. Do you compete on features—or on problems solved better than anyone else? • Organizational Structures, Firm Types, and Ownership Compares functional, divisional, matrix, and network designs, and links legal forms and ownership models to governance, incentives, and agility. Focus is on how to place structures in the service of a strategy. Does your structure speed decision or slow them to a crawl? • Leadership in Organizations and People Management Focus is on leadership styles and leadership tactics. Develops practical skills in goal setting, feedback, motivation, and performance management and examines decision making. Are you managing tasks or unleashing people? • Visionary Leadership, Charisma and Organizational Change Explores how leaders craft direction, build alignment, and sustain commitment through inflection points. Introduces change playbooks, case for change, stakeholder mapping, communication cadence, and quick wins. How do you turn a vision into momentum that survives first contact with reality? • Innovation and Creativity Focuses on generating, selecting, and scaling ideas within existing firms; covers portfolios, ambidexterity, and minimal viable experiments. Shows how constraints, process, and culture channel creativity into outcomes. Is your organization designed to explore and to exploit? • Entrepreneurship, Business Ideas, and New Ventures Guides participants from opportunity recognition to validation, business model design, and financing options. Highlights de-risking through evidence and disciplined iteration. What would make your idea fundable and repeatable? • Organizational Culture Defines culture as shared assumptions, norms, and symbols that shape behavior and performance. Provides diagnostics and levers for shifting culture ethically and sustainably. Does your culture reward the behaviors your strategy needs? • Organizational Life Cycles Charts stages from start-up to scale-up, maturity, renewal, or exit, and the leadership and system upgrades each stage demands. Addresses common failure modes and renewal paths. Are you leading the organization you have—or the stage you’re entering?

Propaedeutic courses
None

Teaching format
• Frontal lectures • Group discussions • Small exercises with intermediate presentations

Educational objectives
Knowledge and understanding: By the end of the programme, students will have acquired the following knowledge and skills: - analyse the demand and supply of goods and services; - the ability to understand the price mechanism in market economies; - the ability to apply the concepts of game theory to the economic behaviour of public and private actors; - the ability to understand the role of governments in market economies; - the ability to analyse the behaviour of economic variables in the short, medium and long run; - the ability to place economic thinking in a historical context and to assess the role of technology and social change in the development of economic thinking; - the ability to understand complex texts in the field of economics in the three languages of instruction; - the ability to analyse human behaviour in organisations; - the ability to understand theories of organisational decision-making; - the ability to understand how political decisions are made and how these decisions affect the economy; - recognising and understanding the conditions necessary for sustainable economic development, taking into account the environment and natural resources; - understand the reasons for economic growth and development of countries; - understand the basic principles of the functioning of labour markets; - estimation and interpretation of econometric models for the empirical analysis of the above problems. Applying knowledge and understanding: - the ability to communicate fluently and spontaneously with native speakers on economic topics; - the ability to analyse corporate governance and merger and acquisition decisions Making judgements Acquire the necessary judgement and methodological tools to critically analyse data, sources, assumptions and implications of scientific practice as well as the political, ethical and legal contexts in which economic phenomena are situated and with which they interact Communication skills Proficiency in written and spoken Italian, German and English, including the translation of these languages. Intercultural competence. Conceptual conciseness, ability to capture facts in writing, especially for scientific and science-based texts Learning skills Promotion of critical thinking and the analytical ability to recognise complex problems in their long-term dynamics and in the diversity of their - also ethical - implications

Additional educational objectives and learning outcomes
Learning outcomes: • Knowledge and understanding: Students will demonstrate a comprehensive understanding of fundamental business administration concepts, including organizational structures, functional areas, and strategic frameworks, providing a robust foundation for future leadership roles within the context of economic and political considerations. • Applying knowledge and understanding: Students will be able to apply core business administration principles to analyze and interpret real-world business scenarios, evaluate competitive environments, and formulate basic strategic decisions, while considering the implications of their choices, preparing them to effectively lead in complex organizational settings. • Making judgments Students will develop the capacity to critically evaluate business problems and strategic options, integrating economic and political perspectives to make informed judgments and propose viable solutions. • Communication skills Students will effectively communicate business concepts and strategic analyses through clear and concise written and oral presentations, fostering collaborative discussions and teamwork within the context of diverse viewpoints. • Learning skills Students will have a firm foundation in business administration and cultivate independent learning skills, enabling them to continuously engage with evolving business practices and adapt to changing economic, political, and ethical landscapes, fostering lifelong learning and ensuring they remain adaptive and effective leaders throughout their careers.

Assessment
The achievement of the learning objectives is assessed through three outcome measures: • Written exam (70%): A written exam in a multiple choice format is designed to measure both the knowledge of the contents and their deeper comprehension (classical knowledge questions) as well as the initial application of what has been learned (case scenarios with alternatives to choose from). • Small exercises with intermediate presentations (20%): For selected units of the course, students will directly apply the knowledge and skills learned in that unit to a case study. • Class participation (10%): Assessment of participation in class will relate to oral and written (e.g., team discussions) contributions by students. Non-attending students are required to engage in an in-depth study of the full course literature and will be assessed through an extended written examination (in a multiple choice format).

Evaluation criteria
For the exam the following evaluation criteria are essential for the assessment: • Basic knowledge of central definitions and terms in connection with important theories, concepts and methods of business administration • the application of basic methods, instruments and tools For the presentations the following evaluation criteria are critical: • Correctness and reliability of the statements • Structure and clarity of the statements • Logic and coherence of the statements • Quality and extent of the research as a basis for the statements • Integration and interconnectedness of the learned content • Activity and proactivity regarding the contributions • Evidence-based choice and application of the learned content