BMI International Executive MBA Class XVII returned from China on Sunday after the module “Chinese Management Practices – Focus on Project Management” delivered by Antai College of Economics and Management (ACEM) at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, a long-time BMI partner which the FT ranks No. 1 in Asia and No. 9 worldwide for custom executive education.
For the first time, lectures were led not only by top Chinese professors, but also by faculty members from BMI founding partner HEC Paris. Also for the first time, as part of BMI’s innovative Individual Mobility Programme, two EMBA participants from Warsaw University of Technology (WUT) Business School joined the BMI group of executives
After an introductory session on business strategy in China, courses and company visits focused on the area of project management: globally, in the specific Chinese context and also with regard to China’s current huge infrastructure investments within the country and all the way to Europe.
Site visits included the Shanghai production site for German high-tech optical device maker Carl Zeiss AG, the Chinese headquarters of global pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca, the major state-owned construction company Shanghai Tunnel Engineering, and Sany Heavy Industry Co. (part of Sany Group) – the largest construction equipment manufacturer in China and No. 5 in the world. Participants especially valued the opportunity to question factory managers about human resource issues, sources of financing, state intervention and competitive pressures.
“Getting a first-hand touch of China’s impressive size and pace of change was impressive and useful, an eye-opening experience about new opportunities and sometimes quite different culture and approaches to doing business,” said BMI class member Arminas Macevičius, who is Business Processes Effectiveness Director Rusia-CIS Area at Takeda Pharmaceuticals. “Sharing these days with fellow students was also a great opportunity to really get to known each other well.”
“China is a major player in the world economy plus a major consumer market, and that’s something any international business leader needs to be familiar with,” said BMI Director General Jaunius Pusvaškis. “More generally, this module on site in China –like the BMI EMBA module in the USA and exchange opportunities so far in Russia, Germany, Poland, Finland and India– is intended to broaden students’ horizons, create networking opportunities and generally foster open-minded thinking about global business development. Such exposure is one reason BMI alumni are succeeding as business executives in 30-plus countries around the world,” he added.
