Introduction |Objectives |Class Organization |Assessment |Project

Course objectives

This course builds the groundwork for developing a balanced perspective on designing organizations using information technology (hence its nickname: DOIT). It begins where most strategy courses end: with the strategic frameworks that guide organizational action. It then continues to build an understanding for implementing strategies - expertise that integrates process design, systems design, and database development. It ends with a prototyping project in which participants develop systems to support process redesigns treating real-world problems. As such, it encourages participants to learn analysis techniques that comprehend both high-level strategic thinking and detailed systems analysis - in ways that integrate both.

So what?

To understand what this means in practical terms, imagine that two years from now you work for a small business unit of a growing company. On Friday afternoon you have a great idea about how to redesign a key process within the business. This course will equip you to return to the office on Monday morning with:

• The concepts and presentation that persuasively articulate your recommendations.
• An information systems prototype that demonstrates conclusively, using a database, how your innovations would be implemented.

That might lead to a positive career trajectory, right? That's what this course is really about: setting you up to provide a significant positive surprise to your current or future professional colleagues in a way that keeps you several steps ahead of the relevant issues and opportunities.

Results so far

In the two to three years that this course has run on an experimental basis (remember the course itself is a prototype; it has extended with each iteration), here are some of the results:

• Changing careers. Some participants have been able to use the course to change the course of their careers. For example, during this course a mortgage banker faced the loss of his department through a bank merger. He now works for a software development company. He got the job based on a project he did in this course.
• Progress on the job. Some participants have been able to use the course to influence events at their current jobs. Several people have developed projects that captured the attention of top managers at their companies, putting them in positive daily contact with their bosses' bosses or higher.
• Starting new businesses. Several participants have used the course to implement ideas that they described in business plans written for entrepreneurship courses at Babson, enabling them to spend 12 weeks thinking through the operations of their planned business in detail.
• Getting the job. Several participants have reported that the course contributed to their success in landing consulting jobs with information systems consulting firms or with the strategic change units of large corporations. They used their projects as a portfolio to demonstrate both conceptual and hands-on skill.
• Useful at work. We are beginning to hear back from alumni of the course that the software experience and process analysis tools that they developed are proving very useful in thinking through problems they need to solve at work.

After spending this much time in an MBA program, we cynics may think it strange to encounter a course whose objective is to give you an advantage that you can really use, but that's what this course tries to do. It won't necessarily be easy: internalizing what we cover in 14 weeks takes a lot of work, plenty of practice, and at times sheer persistence. People who have made the effort in the past have found that can pay off. We sincerely hope it pays off for you too.