Event Review | The Balance Between Marketing & Operations

Voted one of the most popular academic on Global MBA programme among students, Alison teaches in a signature energetic style full of vibes and interaction. 

Alison started the session with a personal career story, revealing that the reason for her academic career originated from her believe of continuously refreshing knowledge to keep up with the changing world.

The attending participants were encouraged to share their personal goals from studying an MBA – be it to lead greater teams, to be exposed to Western education, to build career networks or to facilitate career transformation.

“To choose MBA is a bit like buying a product or a service, apart from brand, looks, and reputation, quality is the main thing. There have been a great number of people with questions, many have sought to solve those problems, some have learned value lessons to share with us. The value of an MBA is so that managers like us can learn from the system knowledge to aid our own practical projects, jobs.”

How to balance marketing and operations is an on-going topic in most companies. Faced with challenges from new marketing and media channels? How do marketing managers position themselves and create greater value? On the other hand, with changing demand from customers and increasing pressure from the bottom line, how do leaders focus on continuously stimulate company growth?

Dr. Ashton pointed out that the design of the Manchester Global MBA programme recognized and inter-play of the two functions and delivers the content under a structure that create sufficient space to for students to critically address these challenges.

“When mentioning Marketing and Operations, what was the main conflict do you think would be”. Asked by Alison, which initiated interesting discussions.

The success of all companies comes from understanding customer and innovative power. This requires both marketing and operations to think from customers' perspective and act accordingly – to create value together.

Companies need to break the boundary with customers - whether it is for Marketing of Operation, both should work together to create value to customer and hence for the company. “Take Huawei for example, in 2018 the company has moved up to the 68th Best Global Brands. The rapid growth of the company is based on its belief for creating convenient and responsive solution to clients” said Alison.

Alison quoted that "Tell me and I'll forget. Show me and I may remember. Involve me, and I learn" to highlight the importance of interactive and practical study, which the design of the course heavily relies on.

Manchester Method is at the heart of the MBA programme. Students are guided by tutors, learning from real cases in the business world, by actively involved in practical projects to put knowledge into practice and solve real business problems. The belief that “Original Thinking Applied” emphasizes adopting creative thinking in the real world. 

Ms. Grace Chen who joined Manchester Global MBA in Jan 2017, shared with us her story. Grace had over 10 years’ experience working in finance industry prior to joining Cornerstone as a consultant.

She emphasize that what is even more valuable than knowledge is the development of critical thinking ability, something she gained during the course of study.