BUS156: Challenges in Business and Management is the  first of two Year 1 modules that show the broad sweep of the challenges that face contemporary societies in relation to how they are managed and how businesses operate.

We will see that at the heart of these "challenges" are concerns that one perhaps might not immediately think are relevant to business and management: social justice, sustainability, and good governance. These values are also foundational values of SBM.

Over the coming weeks we will see how business practices will be forced to change in the face of daunting environmental changes; how Covid-19 has shown the centrality to a number of different institutions and to society at large of jobs that have been considered menial and been poorly paid; we shall see how changes the celebration of self-employment as a sort of brave "entrepreneurialism" has left many unprotected during a pandemic; how "lean and mean" global supply chains have had no stock on which to fall back upon, bringing entire industries to a grinding halt...

The aim, then, of this module is to try to understand these daunting challenges, to grasp them as problems for "business as usual" (they in fact illustrate that "business as usual" is a very doubtful idea full stop), and to develop tools to think them and confront them. 

Instead of lengthy lectures where you need to sit passively, we shall generally give short talks on important research techniques you will need throughout your time at QM, as well as to set up "challenges" for you to confront in "research groups" (groups of approx. 6 students you will stay with throughout the semester). There will be two group challenges, which will be assessed through short group presentations (one for each of the values of social justice and sustainability) each worth 15% of total marks, and a then a final individual essay (on good governance) worth 70%, that will run sequentially throughout the semester. 

The two presentations you will work towards every 3 weeks (presentations week 4 and 8) and the final essay will be due at the end of week 12.

There will be some solo tasks and plenty of working together, so illustrating the importance of team work and peer feedback is something you should try to develop throughout your time at QM and beyond. 

While this will be run face-to-face, you will need to become familiar with Team and OneNote (which we will introduce you to in week 1) for collaborative work that you will need to carry out in between weekly sessions.

We look forward to meeting you all in week 1!

Jack and Matteo