MSc Programme » Programme Structure & Content

This MSc programme is offered on a part-time basis over two years. It involves four semesters of course work and the completion of an individual consultancy work-based project. There are eight core taught modules in the programme. Each module is three hours lecture content per week for 12 weeks per semester. The programme requires attendance on two evenings a week, three hours per evening.

The programme structure provides for the up-skilling and deepening of functional Marketing knowledge and expertise in the first year. The second year then builds upon the deeper functional marketing perspectives gained in year one, moving the learner onwards to develop greater strategic perspective and organisational insights.

The study programme culminates in the completion of a work-based Consultancy Project which offers participants the opportunity to conduct a significant self-directed piece of individual primary research tailored to their own career and business aspirations. Workshops and other supports are delivered to ensure that students get the most from this opportunity.

Subject Breakdown

YEAR ONE
SEMESTER ONE: 1. Contemporary Marketing Matters Recognising that the landscape of marketing, and its management in real-world practice, has developed significantly in recent years, with both theory and practice being re-shaped in real time, this module seeks to move beyond traditional conceptions of marketing and to provide a clear comprehension of the modern world of marketing. 2. The Global Marketplace Yesterday, being a global company meant building an efficient network to source from and penetrate markets around the world. Today the challenge is to innovate and create value by competing on a global scale. This module undertakes a focused examination of business in a global context and aims to facilitate a more critically informed perspective of global marketing issues.
SEMESTER TWO: 3. Integrated Marketing Communications & Digital Media Technology is rapidly changing modes of communication transmission to and from stakeholder groupings, from digital television, through viral marketing and podcasts to social media. This module explores potential strategic and managerial responses to such change, and provides the learner with a critical awareness of the essential elements of integrated communications. 4. Brand Management The development of products into brands creates brand equity, enabling organisations to compete for market share. It is often assumed that all marketing professionals possess brand management skill, despite the complexity of tasks involved in managing a brand. This module provides expert knowledge and tutelage in the practice of brand management from an Irish perspective.

YEAR ONE

SEMESTER ONE:

1. Contemporary Marketing Matters

Recognising that the landscape of marketing, and its management in real-world practice, has developed significantly in recent years, with both theory and practice being re-shaped in real time, this module seeks to move beyond traditional conceptions of marketing and to provide a clear comprehension of the modern world of marketing.

2. The Global Marketplace

Yesterday, being a global company meant building an efficient network to source from and penetrate markets around the world. Today the challenge is to innovate and create value by competing on a global scale. This module undertakes a focused examination of business in a global context and aims to facilitate a more critically informed perspective of global marketing issues.

SEMESTER TWO:

3. Integrated Marketing Communications & Digital Media

Technology is rapidly changing modes of communication transmission to and from stakeholder groupings, from digital television, through viral marketing and podcasts to social media. This module explores potential strategic and managerial responses to such change, and provides the learner with a critical awareness of the essential elements of integrated communications.

4. Brand Management

The development of products into brands creates brand equity, enabling organisations to compete for market share. It is often assumed that all marketing professionals possess brand management skill, despite the complexity of tasks involved in managing a brand. This module provides expert knowledge and tutelage in the practice of brand management from an Irish perspective.

YEAR TWO
SEMESTER THREE: 5. Strategic Management Marketing professionals need to have a holistic perspective of the strategic issues in an organisation. This module introduces participants to the main analytical techniques and conceptual frameworks provided by the strategic management and business policy discipline, with particular focus on how these tools apply in a marketing environment. 6. Change Management & Leadership This module focuses on the management and leadership of organisational change, with a view to developing candidates for more senior managerial roles. Individual competences are explored, and linked to particular creative and innovative aspects of the process of management. Participants gain a systematic knowledge of the key elements of managerial change leadership.
SEMESTER FOUR: 7. Innovation & Commercialisation Successful commercialisation distinguishes innovation from invention through the delivery of customer value. Innovation extends beyond the capability to develop and renew product offerings, to encompass how they are created and delivered to market. Many marketing managers face challenges in this area and this module explores how these may be overcome. 8. Marketing Metrics – A Financial Perspective Performance is generally an issue that is key to the management if not survival of a business. This module leads the participant to consider pluralistic views of marketing performance, through taking a financial perspective, and developing operational competence in financial analysis to underpin marketing leadership and business decision making.
9. Consultancy Project The Consultancy Project signifies the individual competence of the student as having a Masters-level insight into the practice of Marketing. Most participants complete a project on behalf of their own sponsoring organisation. The completed project has two outputs, a management report for the sponsoring organisation, and a dissertation which must meet the academic requirements of a Masters Degree award.
10. Marketing Seminar Series This Marketing Seminar Series provides a forum for industry speakers to engage participants on contemporary issues in the Marketing sphere. During the course of the programme, participants have opportunities to become exposed to leading companies and practitioners as well as leading academics in the field of Marketing.