MBA

At Westminster Business School we focus on developing confident, capable business leaders able to meet the challenges of succeeding in a global business environment. Our MBA graduates take up influential roles within key and growth industries both in the UK and overseas. They make a significant impact both on the businesses in which they operate and the wider business environment.

They have the capability, credibility and judgement to manage significant projects, business units and organisations and provide inspired leadership from a multidisciplinary perspective, coupled with an assertive and principled approach to quality in their practice as professionals.

Our MBA is designed for professionals with at least three years' work experience in a functional specialist or middle/senior management role who aspire to senior executive or chief executive positions. Our students come from diverse professional backgrounds, and include accountants, lawyers, doctors, marketing managers, IT programmers and engineers. They all want to transform their careers and be at the forefront of business leadership.

The Westminster MBA will help you develop skills and acquire knowledge that will be invaluable in furthering your business career. We have strong links with employers and professional bodies and our curriculum reflects the needs of the contemporary business world. Our enthusiastic faculty has extensive academic and professional experience ensuring that class work and projects will be applicable to professional practice and relevant to your own work environment.

Westminster Business School is a preferred supplier of an MBA programme to the UK government.

Throughout the course, there is an emphasis on your personal professional development and enhancing your ability to work at the highest levels within a company. You will do this through a structured programme of tailored, one-to-one mentoring, focusing on your specific issues and career service support, such as preparing for interviews. You will also have the opportunity to attend seminars featuring engaging, expert speakers and a host of dynamic networking events.

Core modules

Consultancy Skills

This module enables you to develop the skills and knowledge required to be an effective internal or external consultant, and understand how to manage the consultancy process. You will also get the opportunity to put the theory into practice by undertaking a group consultancy project with a client company.

Creating Customer Value

You will examine how companies can create customer value by matching their capabilities to the requirements of their customers. You will learn how to develop and implement value-generating strategies.

Identifying and Evaluating Value in the Organisation

This module examines the principles and concepts underpinning different aspects of accounting and finance. In addition you will become familiar with techniques of financial decision making and the particular problems of financing enterprises in emerging economies.

International Study Trip

As part of this module you may have the opportunity to participate in a one-week international study trip, enabling you to apply the learning you have gained during the MBA course to an international context, and gain insights into what it takes to do business in the particular region being visited. You will be able to attend international business meetings and seminars, tour factories, and discuss contemporary business problems with senior managers and executives.

Leading and Managing People

This module explores the nature of the relationship between leadership, people management, organisational culture and organisational behaviour. You will acquire the skills to conceptualise the importance of human factors involved in creating competitive advantage, through exploration of the practical skills and methods needed to lead and develop high-performance organisations.

MBA Compass

Refresh your knowledge of the study skills required to successfully complete your MBA, and enhance your ability to undertake critical analysis of complex situations. You will use data analysis techniques to interpret data in order to support business decision making and write well-structured, lucid board papers and executive reports.

MBA Dissertation

This module provides you with the opportunity to put the knowledge and skills gained from study to practical use by addressing real-life, strategic business issues or management priorities. In doing this, you'll demonstrate that you can think like a senior executive, analysing complex situations and formulating recommendations and plans that will contribute to business success.

Personal and Professional Development

This module comprises a number of different activities including visits, networking events, speaker events, coaching, career workshops, skills workshops and action learning sets. It is designed to develop your career plans based on strong personal and professional skills, abilities and networks.

Strategic Management

This module explores the models and frameworks required to develop and implement strategies capable of delivering success within complex business environments. It addresses key contemporary topics and debates within strategic management. By linking theory to practice, it develops your practical abilities to analyse environments, think strategically and formulate and implement strategies.

Option modules

You will choose two from the following (although, please note that elective modules run subject to a minimum number of eight participants):

Contemporary Leadership

The module provides the opportunity for you to examine a current leadership issue in the context of contemporary theory.

Financial Strategy

This module explores the interaction between financial management and corporate strategy. It provides you with sufficient knowledge to understand the financial implications of possible strategic decisions. It will help you to understand how a company's financial choices can be used to enhance its business strategy and its value.

Foresight and Future Studies

The ability to identify and anticipate the impact future trends and technologies have on the business environment is a key skill for any senior executive. This module provides you with a set of tools and frameworks designed to help you develop better foresight. The initial theoretical perspective is informed by a series of practical exercises culminating in the rigorous application of scenario planning to an industry of your choice.

Innovation and Entrepreneurship

This module provides both a theoretical and practical basis for understanding key elements of entrepreneurship and innovation. It introduces different conceptions and types of entrepreneurship. These include the way in which innovative activities underpin entrepreneurial success, and how a new business venture may be structured and developed as a sustainable commercial enterprise to generate customer value and present a valuable investment proposition.

International Business Negotiation

You will consider the theory and practice of conducting business negotiations within an international business context. You will assess and analyse the theory of negotiation from various perspectives including psychological, sociological, political, behavioural and mathematical approaches.

Programme and Project Management

The module evaluates current project management thinking. You will examine the strategic importance of programme, portfolio and project management in the modern organisation, and scrutinise the tools and theory available to the project manager to drive a project to successful completion.

Responsible Organisations

This module examines successful organisations with respect to ethical policies, practices and sustainability.

Social Entrepreneurship

You will gain knowledge about social enterprises and charities, focusing on the importance of the triple bottom line (people, planet and profit) in the third sector. This module focuses on working on social problems within a challenging overseas environment.

Strategy Dynamics

You will explore the Strategy Dynamics method developed by Kim Warren. This modelling technique has been developed to enable managers to analyse business performance and develop future strategies based on building and retention of resources and capability. While the theoretical underpinning for the method is examined in detail, the module has a strong practical focus.

Sustainability and the Corporation

The module gives you an appreciation of how issues of sustainability affect corporate decision making. It examines the long-term, strategic objectives of the corporation and its relationship with capital markets; it explores how the issues of sustainability affect business policy and communications with capital, labour and product markets.

Our normal minimum requirements for admission are a good Undergraduate Degree (or international equivalent) or a professional qualification, as well as at least three years’ full time supervisory or managerial work experience post-graduation.

If you don't have a degree we may still consider your application, if you have substantial work experience in a position with a high level of responsibility.

If English is not your first language, you will need an IELTS score of 6.5 (with a minimum of 6.0 in each element), or a recognised equivalent.

You will normally be interviewed and, depending on circumstances, you may be asked to take the Graduate Management Admissions Test (GMAT) and achieve a score of 600.

There are two ways for international students to apply for a postgraduate programme at Westminster:

• online via apply online via UKPass
• via apply via our overseas representatives

There is no official deadline for postgraduate applications, but we strongly recommend you apply early (by April for September start and October for January start), especially if you are interested in applying for a scholarship.

If you apply via UKPass, please make sure you include scanned copies of all the following documents:

• a copy of your results transcript from your first degree (translated into English)
• a copy of your English language qualification
• your CV/resumé
• two academic references (letters of recommendation)
• a personal statement (statement of purpose/study plan) that explains:
  • why you are interested in the course(s)
  • why you would like to study at the University of Westminster
  • any relevant skills and experience that you have
  • your career plans

If you are applying by post please include photocopies of the above documents with your application form.

Westminster Business School’s MBA is accredited by (AMBA), the Association of MBAs, which gives our students access to AMBA resources including alumni and career development.

All students on our full-time business Masters courses can apply to undertake the PG/MBA Internship Programme Reflective Practitioner Module. This is an 8 week unpaid accredited internship, which can be taken in addition to option modules and will help students to gain invaluable work experience. The internships, which are with London-based organisations, take place during the summer period. To apply, students must submit a completed application form and a copy of their updated CV to the Business Experience Team; the team then shortlist from the applications and conduct group meetings with the applicants.

Ultimately it is up to our internship employers to decide whether they would like to interview the candidate(s) and offer him/her an internship. We have received very positive feedback from both postgraduate students and employers and expect that the internship programme will continue to remain popular amongst our students.