Course Descriptions
Business Turnaround Management Courses
-
BTM 5000 Business Turnaround Management
BTM 5000 Business Turnaround Management
Credit Hours: 3
Students review concepts, theories, patterns and recent cases of the four stages of corporate sickness: decline, distress, insolvency and bankruptcy. A case study approach and field projects (where appropriate) allows students to examine contemporary product, production, accounting, financial, marketing, alliance and joint-venture-based turnaround strategies. Not open to students who have completed MBA 5640.
-
BTM 5150 Strategic and Legal Bankruptcy
BTM 5150 Strategic and Legal Bankruptcy
Credit Hours: 3
This course deals with legal and strategic aspects of bankruptcy management for business turnarounds. It covers legal environment of running business; formation, execution and defense of contracts, contract remedies, claims and damages with turnaround applications. Strategic bankruptcy and Chapter 7 and Chapter 11 Bankruptcy Law protection: Debtor versus creditor rights, preference transactions, fraudulent convergences and leases in bankruptcy; and bankers versus Lawyers, views of bankruptcy protection are also addressed. Best cases and practices in Bankruptcy Law protections are included.
-
BTM 5200 Motivation and Negotiations Management
BTM 5200 Motivation and Negotiations Management
Credit Hours: 3
Topics in this course include principles, theories, strategies, skills, techniques, and demonstrations of emotional intelligence, motivation and negotiations management in relation to banks, creditors, suppliers, vendors, employees and unions in turnaround situations. Specific negotiation skills include listening and questioning, persuading and bargaining, strategizing, leveraging, framing and planning from confrontation to cooperation. Emphasis will also be placed upon related teamwork, leadership, critical thinking, problem solving, and organizational skills with turnaround applications.
-
BTM 5300 Global Business Transformation Management: Concepts, Models, Theories and Strategies
BTM 5300 Global Business Transformation Management: Concepts, Models, Theories and Strategies
Credit Hours: 3
This course reviews, analyzes, and synthesizes recent concepts, models, theories, strategies and cases of business transformation management. The course focuses on the chief executive officer (CEO) as the strategic leader of the organization, who must lead, who must identify and resolve problems in the corporate business environment, and who must strategize creative, innovative and competitive long-term policies to transform their organizations for the better, in order to ensure sustained competitive advantage and steady growth.
Prerequisites:
- BTM 5000 (Minimum Grade of C, May not be taken concurrently) OR
- MBA 5640 (Minimum Grade of C, May not be taken concurrently)
-
BTM 5350 Organizational Change and Development
BTM 5350 Organizational Change and Development
Credit Hours: 3
Students explore organizational change models and processes such as action research, dialogue, and transformational change. We review and practice skills in managing resistance to change and creating a culture of organizational change. Students acquire positive leadership insights to foster and implement corporate transformation. Ethical implications of organizational change and development are considered. Not open to students who have completed MBA 5850.
-
BTM 5400 Accounting During Cash Crisis
BTM 5400 Accounting During Cash Crisis
Credit Hours: 3
This course addresses cash crises and accounting tools for monitoring and managing cash flows, a critique of fraudulent accounting practices, an introduction to bankruptcy and forensic accounting. Also included are cash crisis management tools such as short-term financial strategies, innovative and rapid cash management and cash collection strategies, cash budgeting and cash flow forecasting, optimal cash management models, and refinancing via debt restructuring and asset management.
Prerequisites:
- ACC 5100 (Minimum Grade of B, May not be taken concurrently)
-
BTM 5420 Corporate Fraud Detection and Prevention Management
BTM 5420 Corporate Fraud Detection and Prevention Management
Credit Hours: 3
Corporate Fraud Detection and Prevention Management: This course focuses on detection, control and prevention of corporate fraud, in view of recent revelations, especially in the area of creative and aggressive accounting and insider trading irregularities that have forced several corporations to bankruptcy. Specific corporate frauds investigated include: creative cash flow reporting, fraudulent financial reporting, recognizing premature or fictitious revenue, aggressive cost capitalization and extended amortization policies, misreported assets and liabilities, creative income statement classifications and recasting pro-forma earnings measures.
Prerequisites:
- ACC 5100 (Minimum Grade of B, May not be taken concurrently)
-
BTM 5450 Corporate Restructuring for Business Turnaround
BTM 5450 Corporate Restructuring for Business Turnaround
Credit Hours: 3
This course covers issues of mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, takeovers, joint ventures and strategic alliances, the implications of business reorganizing via downsizing, facility closings or relocation and off-shoring. Corporate restructuring includes tax implications of restructuring and the issues of restructuring various constituencies claims.
Prerequisites:
- MBA 5180 (Minimum Grade of B, May not be taken concurrently)
-
BTM 5500 Ethical and Critical Thinking
BTM 5500 Ethical and Critical Thinking
Credit Hours: 3
General topics include: major ethical theories, responsibility ethics, virtue ethics, justice ethics, and ethics of trust for BTM professionals. Special topics include: Ethics of rapid cash recovery management, downsizing, plant closings and massive layoffs, offshore outsourcing, relocating, merging, acquisitions, joint ventures, liquidating, and seeking Chapter 7 and 11 Bankruptcy Law protections. The course also addresses the concept and practice of critical thinking as it applies to analyzing turnaround situations and developing responses.
-
BTM 5550 Lean Management
BTM 5550 Lean Management
Credit Hours: 3
Lean principles are most often associated with manufacturing and automotive manufacturing in particular. But lean principles can be applied to any process that can be described. This course will give an introduction to the lean mindset, establish basic principles of lean processes and provide an introduction to various tools useful to improving the efficiency, cost, quality and customer service of a process.
-
BTM 5650 Supply Chain Management for Turnarounds
BTM 5650 Supply Chain Management for Turnarounds
Credit Hours: 3
This course is about strategic management of the flow of products and services from origin through transformation (i.e., procurement, production and distribution) delivery and distribution to ultimate users. Supply chain management (SCM) will be studied especially in relation to e-commerce and Internet procurement and marketing with turnaround applications. Other topics include: quantitative methods in SCM, decision-making, selection and evaluation of vendors, inventory management, resource planning for production, selection and evaluation of distribution channels, and managing long-term relationships up and down the supply chain.
-
BTM 5850 Debt, Equity and Financing Structuring
BTM 5850 Debt, Equity and Financing Structuring
Credit Hours: 3
This course exposes students to a broad range of financial restructuring tools that can be applied to increase an enterprises value. The course illustrates how various corporate restructuring approaches may be used to improve business performance and highlight characteristics of potential candidates for different restructuring techniques. Participants will gain a basic understanding of corporate governance, with particular focus on agency problems and managerial incentives. With industry's ever growing global perspective a significant focus will be placed on an executive understanding and leveraging information technology.
Prerequisites:
- MBA 5180 (Minimum Grade of B, May not be taken concurrently)
-
BTM 5950 Directed Studies
BTM 5950 Directed Studies
Credit Hours: 1 TO 3
Readings and research in a pertinent fields of study chosen by the student and supervised by a faculty member. Conferences, oral reports or papers provided to the supervising faculty are required as evidence of work progress and project completion. May be repeated once with permission of director of Graduate Business Programs. The directed study may be for 1 to 3 credits.
-
BTM 5960 Practicum
BTM 5960 Practicum
Credit Hours: 3
This course is comprised of a field project conducted in collaboration with major turnaround companies in Michigan. Teams of students will be involved during one or two semesters in actual experiences of turning around at least one major or two minor distressed situations.
-
BTM 5990 Master's Thesis
BTM 5990 Master's Thesis
Credit Hours: 6
In-depth research, study and defense of a topic related to Business Turnaround Management, chosen with the assistance of the Student's Thesis Advisor. The student is required to enroll in BTM 5990 for three hours of credit in each of two successive semesters.