COURSE NUMBER: EWMBA 299M-1   

COURSE TITLE: Marketing Strategy   

UNITS OF CREDIT: 3 units   

INSTRUCTOR: Miguel Villas-Boas

MEETINGS DAY(S)/TIME: Wednesdays, 6 – 9:30pm

PREREQUISITE(S): EWMBA 206

COURSE DESCRIPTION:

This course provides the opportunity to sharpen strategic analytic skills by exploring in greater detail selected concepts covered only briefly in the core MBA functional courses, and by introducing additional frameworks specifically addressing strategic decisions; those decisions having a long-term impact on the organization and which are difficult or costly to reverse. Topics to be covered include, but are not limited to:

► strategic market planning frameworks

► causes of strategy underperformance: the “strategy-to-performance” gap

► causes of strategic decline

► strategic growth options and their relationship to profitability

► business context analysis and scenario planning

► managing evolutionary versus disruptive strategic change

► organizational responses to environmental uncertainty

► identifying and articulating unique customer value propositions

► aligning internal operations with external strategic vision

► understanding the process of strategy formulation and strategic thinking

► valuing and implementing strategies

► building strategic capability; the build/buy/ally decision

► managing strategic alliances

The course is cross-functional in its focus, attempting, where appropriate, to integrate marketing, financial, and operational strategy issues.

In order to provide a sense of realism, the course will introduce important concepts through lectures, case studies, and a dynamic marketing strategy simulation game known as MARKSTRAT. Competing in teams throughout the semester, students will have full responsibility for all aspects of competitive strategy and business performance in a dynamic market environment.

What makes the MARKSTRAT simulation challenging and rewarding is the uncertainty associated with overall market conditions, the volatility of each firm’s operating environment, the unpredictability of competitors’ intended strategies, and the responses of competitors to other firms in the industry. Students are assured of a series of unanticipated market and competitive developments which will test and sharpen their strategic market planning skills in a real-world, dynamic, market environment.

Finally, to add to the realism, the class may occasionally be addressed by outside guest speaker(s) with substantial experience and success in marketing strategy. Attendance at these guest lectures is a requirement of the course, notwithstanding that regular class times may need to be adjusted in order to accommodate the schedules of guest speakers.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH:

Miguel Villas-Boas is the Marketing Group Chair and the J.Gary Shansby Professor of Marketing Strategy at the Haas School of Business, UC-Berkeley, where he has been since 1991 after getting his Ph.D. at M.I.T. Before that he did an MBA at INSEAD, France and M.Sc. in Economics at the New University of Lisbon, Portugal. Professor Villas-Boas has published extensively in the areas of marketing strategy, organization design, and customer relationship management. He has been involved in consulting projects in banking and in telecommunications. Professor Villas-Boas has been nominated for, or has won, the Cheit Best teaching Award for several years, and has won the 2009 ISMS Long-Term Impact Award among other research awards. He has published in the Journal of Marketing Research, Marketing Science, RAND Journal of Economics, Management Science, Journal of Economic Theory, Journal of Economics and Management Strategy, Journal of Business, and in other top journals in management. Professor Villas-Boas is a Department Editor for Management Science and an Associate Editor for Marketing Science and Quantitative Marketing and Economics, is in the Editorial Board for the Journal of Marketing Research, and the International Journal of Research in Marketing, and is a founding member of SICS-Summer Institute in Competitive Strategy.

Website: http://groups.haas.berkeley.edu/marketing/profiles/profs/villas.html