The CAS International Management encompasses a two-week intensive program that offers a kaleidoscopic view of management challenges encountered when developing and running an internationally competitive business in the 21st century. Participants discover and experience a broad range of managerial disciplines in a mix of interactive sessions with subject matter experts, case studies and guest speakers from industry, and teamwork assignments with the internationally recruited student cohort.
Preparing for the study weeks, participants reflect on the current state of internationalization within their organizations and assess their own management skillsets for the global stage. An online session well ahead of the study weeks lays the foundation for participants to interact in an applied, collaborative assignment that continues throughout the program.
Module Program
Module 1: online kick-off and self-guided preparatory study
Developing Foundations for International Collaboration
a) Discovering a global mindset
Participants reflect and weigh given objectives in a global context at a personal, organizational and macroeconomic level; they effectively interact with partners to identify common ground for successful cooperation while researching relevant sources and judge ambiguous information on an assignment.
b) Assessing international capabilities
Participants adopt behavioral strategies for the particular context and individually adapt to working in a global environment while understanding the competencies, skills and different emphasis, attitudes and knowledge areas to work internationally.
c) Preparing for international collaboration
Participants build effective collaboration in internationally diverse teams to execute team activities towards common goals while balancing work and best using a diverse skill set for synthesizing and presenting relevant information to a diverse audience.
Modules 2-4 are grouped into an intensive two-week program on site in Lucerne:
Module 2: Monday to Friday of week 1, onsite in Lucerne
Fostering International Management Opportunities
a) Seizing international business opportunities in the 21st century
Participants discern various strategic approaches to building a global business to benefit from internationalization, digitalization, globalization, and international trade. They can anticipate global developments and manage their impact on an organization’s business model to make informed and reflected management decisions on where and how to create international organizational structures / partnerships and legal entities to access markets, clusters and global supply networks. They apply pragmatic best practices to various industries and company cases for maximum impact with given resources from large corporations to SMEs.
b) Steering financial flows to enable a global business model
Participants incorporate cross-border financial management in a global business model, define reporting and controlling measures to follow relevant KPIs in an international setting to ensure business viability across borders. They embed financial management within the overall international management discipline and connect its functions and tasks to relevant stakeholders.
c) Marketing to the global customer
Participants differentiate advantages of global branding and local marketing; they collect and process relevant information (e.g. describe diverging customer needs or local market conditions) to adapt an integrated marketing mix across borders and use digital marketing strategies for increasing reach and relevance with customers globally. Participants design a cross-border customer journey for internationally mobile customers to build global brand equity.
d) Designing international operations of excellence
Participants understand the need and effort required to translate corporate strategy to integrated operations in an international context, combining and aligning various managerial disciplines (e.g. process management, innovation, organizational structures, HRM, quality management). They apply key concepts of operational excellence to an international environment and design global sales and supply networks to the advantage of an organization, understanding how they support and advance a business model. Understanding the advantages and challenges in using digital transformation to build a global operation of excellence, they tap into diverse digital and start-up ecosystems around the world.
e) Ensuring compliance in divergent legal contexts
Participants comprehend key differences in legal aspects and other contexts in an industry or business and how they shape compliant behavior while understanding differences between judicial systems and how they shape the corporate behavior of local and international organizations. They judge the quality of an organization’s setup and application of (corporate) compliance while applying best practices in global compliance to practical cases.
Module 3: Saturday of week 1 and Monday of week 2, onsite in Lucerne
International Business Simulation
a) Navigating an International Business Environment
Using an interactive method of teaching and learning (Action Learning) through a sophisticated, computer-based, management simulation, students effectively think and act more entrepreneurially when faced with international business opportunities. They implement and monitor effects of long-term business objectives while assessing opportunities and risks in global markets to formulate and implement goal-oriented global and regional plans.
b) Reflecting International Business Execution
In assessing several business cycles of the simulation, participants understand macroeconomic and microeconomic volatility in markets and react accordingly with a future-oriented mindset to understand and actively shape global competitive structures.
Module 4: Tuesday to Friday of week 2, onsite in Lucerne
Building International Management Capabilities
a) Leading ethically in ambiguous contexts
Participants describe common and diverse ethical standards and behaviours in international business settings while identifying common ethical dilemmas that arise in international business interactions. They find constructive approaches to behaving ethically to instill ethical behavior also in ambiguous international business contexts and reflect on their own ethical compass.
b) Developing international organizations abroad and at home
Participants understand foundational procedures of organization development and can adapt these procedures for implementation in divergent international/ intercultural settings. They assess the need for change in specific business situations, to determine the prospective scope of change based on this assessment, and to design and implement fitting initiatives in international settings while applying models and techniques acquired in the context of a case.
c) Managing international teams
Participants find constructive ways of leading/collaborating with international team members when advancing international business projects. They identify challenges and opportunities of international teamwork (focus on intercultural diversity, geographic (dis-) localization, virtual collaboration) and derive constructive approaches to overcome the challenges to make use of the inherent opportunities, and to apply appropriate managerial tools.
d) Managing global talent
Participants consciously incorporate a fitting global talent management framework into their international business, thereby aligning (future) strategic goals and human resources (development). They identify divergent ways of defining talent, addressing talents, and advancing talent development in various business contexts and across an international business operation.
