Smurfit School at UCD offers open day for chance to appreciate MBA programmes

Feel like you’ve got “C-suite material” written all over you? Hankering after the key to the executive washroom? If you’re determined to fast-track your career to the top of the corporate ladder, then check out the UCD Michael Smurfit Graduate Business School’s MBA Experience Day this Saturday.

Prospective MBA participants will get a flavour for the course, starting with a taster lecture (30 minutes long as opposed to the standard three hours) on negotiation, which is a core module of the programme.

There will also be a workshop on the course’s leadership development programme, followed by a talk on the international dimension of the MBA: the course includes an annual trip overseas and there is also an exchange programme that allows students to spend a few weeks studying in a foreign institution.

"We're trying to pack a lot into a half day to give a condensed experience of the MBA, and what it can do for them," says Cathy Timlin, spokeswoman for the Smurfit School.

“This is the fourth one that we have run and they’re really well attended.

“The people that come tend to be very serious about doing an MBA,” she adds. “There’s an element of nurturing them along the decision process.”

Timlin says that prospective candidates tend to be particularly interested in finding out what type of classmates they are going to have, because building up contacts is a key aspect of the programme, as is peer-to-peer learning.

To this end there’ll be a talk by students currently undertaking both the full-time one-year MBA, and the part-time two- year executive programme, as well as alumni coming back to talk about what the qualification has done for them.

The full-time course usually attracts a younger profile of candidates, with the average age coming in at about 30.

The executive MBA has an older profile, with 35 the average age.

It is a big investment, Timlin says, both financially and in terms of time commitment, particularly for the part-time students as they often have to juggle work and family. More information on the MBA Experience Day is at smurfit school.ie/mbaexperience.