The Master’s Degree in Business Administration (MBA) with a focus on Management is introduced targeting individuals in both the private and public sectors and aims at equipping senior managers and administrators with leadership skills and competencies that will enable them to manage their businesses and institutions successfully.
The Government of Malawi has adopted a strategy for development and growth spanning 2017-2022. This is the Malawi Growth & Development Strategy III (MGDS III). This blueprint recognizes that the failure of the country to move to a developmental state has slowed down national socio-economic development, making Malawi a consuming and importing state with very little being invested into industry, technology and private sector activities to promote manufacturing and export growth.
According to MGDS III, the plan for spurring growth recognizes provision of education and skills as key to providing the human capital required for socio-economic development and industrial growth. Unicaf University Malawi aims to play a part in the national effort to increase accessibility to tertiary education in general. Its online model, combined with its scholarship scheme makes high quality tertiary education accessible to a much larger number of students than could be absorbed in a traditional face-to-face setting. Unicaf, therefore meets the goal of availing tertiary education to as many Malawians as possible. More particularly, the MBA in Finance programme will contribute towards the realization of the national vision for growth and development as outlined by the rationale below.
Rationale for the Programme
There is a critical requirement for good managers across all business sectors and within the public sector and civil society sectors. Good management can make an organization. Bad management can break an organization. As such, good managers are in high demand. This MBA focusing on Management seeks to produce graduates that employers can be assured are competent, with a set of professional knowledge and skills. It seeks to produce graduates who are equipped with strong professional values who are fully aware of the best ethical practices, which are a prerequisite for success in business management and leadership.
One of the four pillars for the implementation of the national blueprint for economic growth and poverty alleviation, the Malawi Growth & Development Strategy (MGDS) III, is “human capital development” (Government of Malawi, 2017). It is in response to the call by the government for increased private sector involvement in the field of education and training that Unicaf University, in general, develops its programmes.
In particular, this online MBA programme with a specialization in Management was developed with a view to providing the skilled manpower needed to support the expected demand for business and public sector management that accompanies any growth of the economy. Business managers, and associated entrepreneurs, are critical in both public and private sector organizations and can greatly facilitate and support the growth of small and medium enterprises
Aim of the Programme
The programme aims to develop the knowledge and skills necessary for successful strategic leadership performance, within the context of dynamic local and global challenges by enhancing the graduate’s ability to source, analyze and critically appraise all types of business data and practice, and to develop flexible strategies for satisfying diverse stakeholder and partner demands across the whole supply chain and other value-adding systems.