The first MBS Executive Series is about to begin!

After weeks of interesting content highlighting the Executive Series faculty and their ongoing research areas and specialties, the programs are about to begin!

Registrations are closing soon, so don't miss out on your opportunity to sharpen a specific skill area, refresh some prior education or prepare your organisation for an aggressive growth agenda.

Join Ian Williamson for Creating Value through People on Tues 22 February till Wed 23 February 

Mark Ritson will bring you up to speed with Brand Management on Thurs 24 February till Fri 25 February 

Make Change Happen with Paul Kirkbride on Mon 28 February till Tues 1 March 

Debi Mishra will help you Manage Strategic Partnerships on Wed 2 March till Thurs 3 March

Price in a competitive environment with Sven Feldmann on Wed 2 March till Thursday 3 March

REGISTER HERE

Founders as the Logo of their own Brands? | Mark Ritson

Branding guru Mark Ritson says that founders are fundamental to a brand’s fortune because they have the brand in their bones.

• 'When a founder runs their own brand it can confer astonishing strategic advantages.' 

• 'Time and again, they instinctively and instantly make the right decision.'

• 'The most powerful form of marketing communication occurs when a founder talks about their business. Suddenly consumers listen. Even more amazing, they believe.'

• 'Such is their power, that when the founder finally departs, dies or retires many brands struggle to retain their trajectory. A fact reflected in the 6% drop in Apple’s share price since the news of Steve Jobs’ departure was announced.' 

Steve Jobs

• 'There are many cases where a founder returns to their failing brand and resurrects it. Steve Jobs did it against all the odds in 1997 and Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel did it in 1963 and at the age of 70.' 

Coco Chanel

On a not so side note, here is a break down of Apple’s iPhone profit margin, compiled by Mark Ritson and an example of top brands using extreme methods to make profits.

In what ways do you think this will change now that Steve Jobs is gone?

Google also announced a pretty huge management changeover, in this case from non-founder Eric Schmidt to co-founder Larry Page. Read more about this in Ritson’s article here. 

Eric Schmidt

Larry Page

Ritson’s Brand Management program as part of the MBS Executive Series is filling up. Don’t miss out on the chance to learn from one of the top associate professors in marketing, an award winning columnist, and a consultant to some of the world’s biggest brands. 

Mark Ritson

For more on his program, click here or contact Marianne Carollo at the Melbourne Business School +61 3 9349 8292 or m.carollo@mbs.edu 

“It’s not you it’s me.” Ever wondered how to better manage your sponsorship relationship? | Richard Speed

A message from Richard Speed, 

"When the football clubs of Australia announce their new sponsorships for the year, the sponsoring firms explain how proud they are of the association and how central the relationship is to their marketing strategy. I am happy to guarantee, here and now, that by the end of the season, bad behaviour by players, officials or a club as whole will lead to some of those sponsors cutting their ties as fast as possible, leaving their marketing strategy in tatters.

Sponsorships are one of the situations in marketing when you rest the success of your strategy on something outside the firm and outside your direct control. If you manage these relationships like your traditional resources, your risk of failure goes through the roof.


Have you had any experiences like this? Please share them below.

And to learn how to better manage these risks, join me for Hired, borrowed or stolen; Making your marketing strategy work with someone else’s resources, starting March 2nd."

Richard Speed

Richard’s research focuses on creating effective marketing strategy and valuable brands, such as sponsorship and its use in marketing strategy.

QUESTION: How do I get my top management to pay attention to Marketing? | Don O’Sullivan

ANSWER: Reposition it from an Activity to an Investment 


........Obviously but......



How can I make this happen?

What are the approaches leading marketers take to ensuring that marketing becomes mission critical and not as a discretionary activity?

What role does marketing play within these firms and what practices and approaches can we adopt from them?

How can I sell marketing internally an what is the best way to make a case to the board for marketing expenditures?

We already have an array of marketing metrics... Can we get beyond metrics?

The best performing firms show that the solution is both simple and complex: 

1. Position marketing as the engine room of growth within the organisation
2. Charge marketing with the task of building and leveraging the firms market based assets
3. Create a business enabling mindset within the marketing function as a basis for engaging with other functions
4. Develop, deploy and manage credible, reliable, predictive measures of marketing's contribution
5. Leverage marketing's 'wins' to raise the function's sphere of influence and contribution to the firm

Don O'Sullivan

In this two day program, Marketing and Firm Value, we will work with the frameworks and practices adopted by the leading marketers. We will learn from the experience emerging from best and worst practice and provide a basis for ensuring that marketing optimises its contribution to the performance of the firm and is recognised as a key business driver.

Gucci, Chanel and Bulgari – oh my! Follow the yellow brick Tweet! | Mark Ritson

Mark Ritson highlights how luxury brands including Chanel, Gucci, Louis Vuitton and Bulgari have been slow to embrace e-commerce, but are now starting to take the idea seriously. 


Burberry, which has 2 million fans on Facebook, now has an iPad app allowing customers to order products well ahead of their local launch, while Bulgari uses YouTube and Twitter. 


Ritson says luxury brands like to break rules in terms of fashion, but it has taken time for them innovate in their business strategies. 


Source: AFR, Nov 2010

Interestingly, Ritson also suggests that Social Media is for People, not Brands. He points out that Peter Andre has more followers on Twitter than the top 20 British brands combined.


What do you think? How has social media helped with your own branding experience? 


For more on Mark Ritson's experience with brands and marketing, download his podcast here.


Follow his yellow brick Tweets, for regular shots of branding knowledge.


Finally, if all this doesn't make you want to see the man in action, have a look at what you can learn from his Executive Series session, Brand Management.

Mark Ritson

Are the banks taking us for a ride? | Mark Crosby

Mark Crosby’s academic interests are in the areas of international economics, with a particular interest in how exchange rates function. 

Mark Crosby

Interview | Mark Crosby | ABC 612 Brisbane | 3 November 2010

Madonna King says Treasurer Wayne Swan has promised reform for banks but it is too late for yesterday's increase by the Commonwealth Bank. She says Westpac has just reported an 84% jump in profit. Interview with Mark Crosby, Associate Dean, Melbourne Business School, Melbourne University. Crosby says he doesn't think new regulations are desirable in Australia as the current ones are good. He says the public perception that banks are taking us for a ride is unfounded. Crosby says some of Joe Hockey's suggestions were reasonable. He says the issue is more politics than economics. Crosby says banks are more regulated than in the US. He says he expects the other banks to follow the Commonwealth Bank and increase their rates. Crosby says share holders are not gouging everyone else.

Article | Mark Crosby | Australian Financial Review | 10 November 2010

FORGET THIS GOLDEN OPPORTUNITY, AFR, pg 21

Robert Zoellick, president of the World Bank, recently suggested a possible return to an international gold standard for currency. However, there are numerous theoretical and practical arguments against such a move, and central banks such as the Reserve Bank of Australia have demonstrated that there are better ways to control inflation and international accounts.

Source: MBS Media Coverage

Welcome to the MBS Executive Series official Blog

The MBS Executive Series blog will keep you up to date with everything you need to know about the series.

Look out for:

• Interesting content about faculty members and their unique research areas
• Info about each Executive Series program, including Marketing, Branding, HR, Strategy, Ethics, Change Management and Communication.
• Website Links
• Podcasts
• Imagery
• Questions

Also keep track of the Executive Series through our Facebook page and Twitter account.


All information about each individual program can be downloaded from the Executive Series Website.


You can also register for each of the programs online. For example follow this link to register for Mark Crosby and Jody Evan’s Understanding the International Market. Links to other programs can be found below.


MBS Executive Series 2011 | 16 Individual Programs
2 days each | Over 2 weeks


Tues 22/Wed 23 February
Understanding the International Market
Developing Psychological Flexibility
Strategic Management of Intellectual Property
Creating Value Through People

Thu 24/Fri 25 February
Brand Management
Business Ethics in Asia
Building a Winning Organisation
Business and World Trade

Mon 28 February/Tues 1st March
Marketing and Firm Value
Making Change Happen
Using Regression for Data-Based Business Decisions
Clarity in Communication - Structured Thinking

Wed 2nd/Thur 3rd March
Hired, Borrowed and Stolen: Making your Marketing Strategy Work with Someone else's Resources
Managerial Decision-Making
Managing Strategic Partnerships
Pricing in a Competitive Environment