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Home HRAcademia NEVER STAND STILL: Step up to meet today’s challenges with the Blue MBA

NEVER STAND STILL: Step up to meet today’s challenges with the Blue MBA

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Irene Rosberg

NEVER STAND STILL: Step up to meet today’s challenges with the Blue MBA

The Blue MBA is extending a welcome to men and women in the new generation of shipping executives who realise they need to acquire out-of-the-ordinary skills to meet today’s challenges, writes Irene Rosberg, programme director of the world-renowned MBA

Everyone knows that we are living in extraordinary times. That being so, it is imperative that we push ahead with extraordinary vigour in equipping our industry’s best management material with the incisive strategic knowledge and vision to overcome the challenges of the era.

Many among the managerial cadre will undoubtedly beat a path to advantage and success within their specialist sectors and given today’s tumultuous economic currents they need all the support we can offer.

Our Executive MBA in Shipping & Logistics (known widely as the Blue MBA), which is under the aegis of Copenhagen Business School, has a sole mission: to furnish our course participants with the best in academic theory coupled with an unrivalled depth of practical business knowledge.

This will arm not solely our students but the industry as whole with the analytical capabilities to sharpen its competitive power – given our links with all segments of maritime business.

Proud of our base in the Danish capital, one of the leading hubs of shipping expertise and innovation, we reach out around the world to help train the new generation of leaders.  It is a global perspective that our industry must keep firmly in mind, in deeds and not just words. Globalisation, unleashed long ago, has drawn world trade to record levels. One can criticise some impacts of globalisation, but one thing is certain: it cannot be “put back in its box.”

No-one can doubt that in a year that has witnessed both macro-economic and pandemic-related shocks buffeting our industry, there is a need for constant renewal of clear and canny thinking. Amid the shake-ups, executives require bold and confident strategies, to stay ahead.

As always, our aim at the Blue MBA is to recruit a class which is as geographically diverse as possible, which means we welcome applicants from every jurisdiction. Our record in this ambition is strong. Since the programme was launched in 2001, we have graduated some 280 candidates – from 45 countries – who all hold senior management positions. Our current class of 43 men and women from all walks of the industry are expected to graduate in August 2021 and we shall be registering a new group of men and women for the Class of 2023, to start their study in September of 2021. Our 280 graduates have gone from strength to strength in high-level corporate and organisational roles and have testified to the Blue MBA having been a key stepping-stone in their professional journey.

The Blue MBA has become a microcosm of the newly diverse nature of the industry in a further way: a priority is helping bridge the gender gap by encouraging female executives.

We have the backing of leading organisations in the industry because of the programme’s vital relevance to the sectors we serve. The industry has been generously supportive of those who sign up for the programme, not least because every aspect on which we focus relates in one way or another to enhancing the contribution of the candidates to their employers’ goals.

Senior leaders have spoken publicly, including at our biennial Graduation Day ceremonies, of how the course brings substantial real benefit to the individual businesses the graduates serve and to the wider industry. They have perceived that the course goes much deeper than merely being an “academic exercise.”

Now that the immediate shockwave of the corona virus pandemic has subsided, attention is being refocused on the critical juncture that the industry has reached, with technology forcing the pace of change. Alongside getting to grips with digital transformation including new uses for data, with technical shifts and remote operation, it is essential that we foster the human element – to grow the knowledge and capability of the individual, supplying him or her with a ‘toolbox’ of analytical expertise and competence in decision-making.

Maintaining a strong position in the market cannot be achieved without a deep understanding, not only of the specific business that someone is in, but also of all the relevant industries and influences around their core interests.

The call of the hour is for an all-around, 360-degree awareness of the industry’s needs and concerns. Making the best use of a leadership position entails a grasp of such varying aspects as finance and the demanding and rapidly changing regulations on greenhouse gas and other environmental matters that bear down on the industry.

It is an industry that never stands still, and reflecting this, we rework our programme constantly while keeping sight of our objectives. This is translated into action by our world-class faculty who ‘speak the language’ of the industry. They ensure that the lessons of practical experience are combined with an educational grounding, yielding advantages that cannot be acquired under the pressures of office routine.

The Blue MBA is designed to suit working professionals who are never off-duty. We structure the lectures and study sessions so that they can devote time to their normal responsibilities. Eight modules are spread over 22 months, and during the final seven months each participant works on a major project of strategic importance to their company and usually to the wider industry. This thesis is known as the Integrated Strategy Project.

Throughout management education at present, one of the challenges is a switch to online tutorials, necessitated by the Covid-19 restrictions, which normally means that it will be difficult for institutions to form the kind of close networks that students of all kinds tend to accumulate. This will not be a problem for the Blue MBA, even though some of its sessions might perforce have to be conducted remotely.

This is because a crucial benefit of the Blue MBA is that it ensures participants learn from each other as well as from their tutors, conducive to building lasting networks. That participants come from across the industry disciplines is a huge advantage and deepens the well of available knowledge.

While all alumni are effectively ambassadors for the programme, at any one time up to a dozen are given specific regional or specialist ambassadorial responsibilities. The establishment in 2016 of our Blue MBA Alumni Association has strengthened the connections between present and former students as an immensely valuable network: of people who understand each other’s way of thinking.

Many of these executives assert that taking the course was the best career move they made.  They include some with 20 years or more of experience – one of them told of feeling trapped in a rigid mindset at a time when fulfilling his job was crying out for a holistic, global approach to the industry.

Further information for the next intake is available from programme director Irene Rosberg at ir.mbs@cbs.dk

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1 comment

jeffrey pachter November 12, 2020 - 3:49 PM

I am seeking more info on this program, incl tuition, duration and learning format(s), please.

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