Human Resource Management

Every business aims to achieve its goals thought building its competitive advantage. Human resource management is a  key factor for gaining a competitive advantage is the management of human resources. Understanding the principles of Human Resource Management is a catalyst for the success of a company. Nowadays, Human Resource Management (HRM) faces many challenges. The purpose of the course is to familiarize students with the basic principles, functions and practices of Human Resource Management thus enabling them to acquire not only knowledge, but also the critical thinking required to effectively respond to the challenges of the modern working environment, either from the perspective of human research management practitioner or from the perspective of employee of other departments.

Upon completion of the course students will be able to:

  • Recognize the importance of HR as a core administrative function
  • Understand the strategi role of Human Resource Management
  • Effectively manage issues of selections, compensation, training and development of employees, as well as of performance management.
  • Understand employee attitudes and behaviors
  • Understand and increase employees’ motivation
  • Cooperate with experts of other departments of an organization
  • Understand and effectively manage diversity issues within the workplace.

Advanced Approaches to Management

The aim of the course is to provide students with the opportunity to develop a strong conceptual framework for analysing organisations, evaluating the role of managers in contemporary organisations and managing change. The course introduces numerous theories dealing with organisational structure and culture, groups and leadership, technology and innovation, management learning and problem – solving. These theories are used as resources for handling effectively case studies and role-play exercises. A number of short-videos are also shown to highlight different managerial challenges in today’s organisations.

Food Marketing

The basic objective of this course is the understating of marketing principles, strategies and tools that may be used to implement (or evaluate) a marketing plan, focusing on the agricultural market. Specific, after this course students will be able to:

  • Grasp and implement the concept of marketing
  • Create and critically evaluate a marketing plan, incorporating principles of marketing research

Strategic Management

The purpose of the course is to examine the formulation and implementation of strategy in food and agriculture businesses and their influence on the fulfilment of organizational goals. The content of the course consists of the following parts: 1. Strategic Analysis of the environment, the industry, the competition, the various stakeholders for the business, as well as the possibilities of the business. 2. Strategic decisions that focus on the ability of the business to recognize opportunities and threats inherent in environmental changes and to develop strategies to deal with the changes. 3. Actions to implement the strategy based on organizational capabilities and values, so that food and agriculture businesses gain lasting and sustainable competitive advantages. 4. Organizational change and the role of culture in business strategy.

Financial Analysis & Accounting

The aim of the module is to offer to students a detailed overview of the principles of financial accounting and reporting (i.e. disclosures to users of financial information for operating results; financial position and cash flows of a business entity) and utilise this in investment decisions. The essential function of financial statement analysis is often ignored due to companies’ numbers being viewed as a jargon in which it is difficult to assess how well an entity is performing. This course will deal with this misconception, by emphasizing information which is relevant in making investment, credit and possible valuation decisions. A user’s perspective, rather than a preparer’s is adopted, since most MBA and Master students will become users of financial statements rather than preparers. However, in order to become users, students must also understand how the financial statements are prepared. Therefore, the students’ attention will be directed towards thinking on the quality of earnings, and not just the reported numbers.

No prior knowledge of accounting and financial statement analysis is necessary. The core objectives of the module are to provide students with an understanding of:

  • The information contained in the financial statements and the effects of economic events on them;
  • The framework for making business decisions using information in financial statement; what choices can be made, what the options are, how can related data be used for various types of investment decisions.

Upon completion of the course, students will be able to:

  • Understand the “language” of business, its uses and limitations;
  • Interpret and understand the impact economic events have on the Balance Sheet, Income Statement, Statement of Changes in Equity and Statement of Cash Flows;

Use the information reported in Financial Statements for investment decisions.

Applied Statistics for Managerial Decisions

The aim of the current course is to describe the most widespread methods of statistical data analysis in a simple way without complex mathematical proofs and formulas, so that it is possible to be understood by all students of different research backgrounds and directions who will deal with the Management of Food Businesses. For this reason, particular emphasis has been placed on examples, exercises and case studies that are presented and analyzed in a suitably organized computer lab.