Glyndwr University MBA: Ground breaking executive postgraduate degree!

“Glyndwr University MBA programs’s success will give firms confidence. This is a success of a ground breaking new executive postgraduate degree program.” That is according to Professor Chris Jones, Head of Business at the Wrexham institution of Glyndwr University.

Glyndwr Business School’s inaugural Executive MBA is fast-approaching the halfway mark, and Professor Jones says the next cohort will benefit from the “vast experience” gained by everyone in the department this year. The “blended learning approach”, including interactive taster sessions with some of the top names in UK commerce, has attracted students from industry and companies across the region.

Glyndwr University is a British university with campuses at Wrexham, Northop and St Asaph in north-east Wales. Formerly known as the North East Wales Institute of Higher Education (NEWI), it was granted full university status in 2008 after being a member of the University of Wales since 2003.

Prof Jones hopes to see more people joining in 2014, now the degree is established and catering for the regional market. “Nobody else in North Wales is doing an executive MBA for local companies,” said Prof Jones, who also launched Wales’ first Entrepreneurship degree at Glyndwr.

“We still value the classroom experience, having a dialogue with the lecturer, not just distance learning. Engaging and interacting with well-respected business people such as George gives students an edge over those on other courses – they’re learning from the best.”

“The blended learning approach is a model used by many universities as it’s more cost effective, but we know there is a desire to keep things local so we’re pursuing that.”

Prof Jones added: “There are no exams, it’s all assessment. They’ll take learning from each module and reflect it back onto their organisation through branding, being more lean etc. Putting people on the MBA course is an investment. Feedback has been extremely positive, with students commenting that the ‘presentation and content were excellent’ and that the modules ‘will bring my financial planning and budgeting to a more professional level’.”

George Savva, a businessman with more than 20 years’ marketing experience, is among the Executive MBA’s guest lecturers.

He helped to increase sales of Nescafe when working as a marketer in his native South Africa by placing the brand’s products in unusual areas of supermarkets and releasing a coffee-scented aroma as customers walked past.