Knowing the context surrounding the corporation is essential to understanding its value agenda. This starts not from the company itself, but from the environment in which it seeks to operate and contribute.

The geo-political scene

In order to lead effectively within your market and your organisation, you have to see the bigger picture in which global and national economies are set.

The global economy

Recovery, growth, restructuring, the role of the financial markets and the impact of innovation and new technology on economic growth are all covered in this session.

Technology and organisations

One of the key determinants of economic growth is technological progress. This session examines the effect of technology, particularly information technology, on organisations and industries.

Communicating across cultures

We carry our cultural contexts with us. This module presents a framework not only to support interactions at INSEAD but to understand cultural differences more widely.

Understanding your professional environment

This session focuses on topics such as the difficulty of straight-forward communication in a professional or personal setting and the difficulties imposed by professional hierarchies or motivational structures.

Corporate governance

This module presents the latest research and international perspectives on the issue of corporate governance and brings you right up to date with the latest developments in a world post-Enron.

Having grasped the context of your company, you are now in a possession to see its value agenda more clearly. Redefine your own role as a senior manager in the process of creating both value and values – for shareholders, customers and stakeholders alike.

Customer value, value chain analysis, value creation and capture

Identify the value-adding activities in the value chain. Adapt your strategies as the source of value migrates along the value chain. And unlock the potential of all these insights for your business.

Value innovation

Challenge conventional wisdom and learn how to create your own Blue Ocean Strategy.

Economic value added

Ultimately, returning maximum value to shareholders is what business is all about. This session takes you back to basics and right up to the cutting edge of research in this most fundamental area.

Strategy, performance and implementation

This module deals with the formulation of strategies, and their relationship with organisational performance.

Ethical issues in global organisations

Today’s senior executives have to seek – and find – ethical as well as financial value. Rise to this new challenge with the expert guidance of this session.

Having gained insights into your organisation’s context and its value agenda, you are ready to benchmark corporate and personal strengths and weaknesses. As a top manager, you cannot create and deliver value alone. In order to do so, you have to develop a compelling vision to which others will commit. You also need to keep innovating – and growing the resources needed to make change happen.

Leadership and leading change

How to create a high-performance culture by supporting learning and autonomy. And how to use the political structure of an organisation to effect change.

Organisational diagnosis

This session sets out the principles for effective strategic analysis of any organisation, whether public, private, or not-for-profit.

Inspirational leadership

Prepare to be uplifted and inspired by looking at leadership through the lens of Shakespearean drama. Henry V tells the story of an epic leadership journey with principles that remain valid today.

Leadership archetypes

The final session uses experiential learning to identify four basic leadership archetypes that are each essential in different situations. This is the fundamental challenge for leaders: changing your leadership style and objectives to fit the situation.

Fair process

As members of social groups, we are particularly sensitive to the lack of fairness, whether experience by ourselves or those around us. This session deals with the role of fairness in leadership – and its relation to sustainability and performance.

The three themes finally feed, with INSEAD’s guidance, into your own twofold agenda for change. The objective is higher performance – both for your organisation (or business unit) and your life. Indeed, the two are so closely intertwined that it’s impossible to separate them.

Understanding yourself in relation to others

Understand your perceptions and psychology to improve your leadership performance at senior management level. The Advanced Management Programme uniquely uses a small group of programme peers and a professional coach to gain new understanding of yourself and others.

360° feedback on your leadership style

Based on INSEAD’s 360° feedback instrument and classroom discussions, you identify your strengths and weaknesses. Most importantly you define strategies to harness the former and to prevent the latter from holding you back.

Setting a breakthrough agenda for your business

Develop a six-month action plan, validate its underlying diagnosis with your peer group, and develop an implementation strategy. Then commit to your breakthrough agenda – and continue to report back to the class on your progress after the programme is over.

Coalition building and network management

This session explores the use of personal and professional networks to lead successful change.

Re-entry

The programme pays particular attention to the crucial question of re-entry following an intense and motivating experience at INSEAD. Transferring value from the programme to your life and work is a significant challenge – rise to it and relish it.

Please note that the programme content may change slightly from one session to another.

We think our diversity is what makes us different – and better, especially for participants who wish to prepare for a very turbulent and challenging international arena. INSEAD is probably the only school where you will typically find around 30 nationalities in the same class. And it’s certainly the only school where no single culture will dominate. The second major reason is that INSEAD has forty years’ experience of educating top executives. The Advanced Management Programme reflects “our best practice” in providing participants with an intense yet full general management experience.

What exactly does the selection process entail?

It’s important for all participants that the programme brings together people with an adequate level of general management experience, professional expertise and business responsibility. The quality of the programme and its classroom exchanges is only as high as the quality of its participants. The Programme Director personally reviews every application and, if he feels you’d benefit more from another programme that meets your needs more closely, our expert advisor will let you know. Please feel free to get in touch with her before applying.

There are a few guidelines that the Programme Director applies in reviewing applications. The intrinsic quality of the applicant – and their potential contribution to the learning environment – also matter a lot. Businesses or business units ought to have a minimum turnover of €30 million and the candidates ought to be CEO or MD. For businesses exceeding €100 million, the candidates can be members of the executive leadership team, maybe one level away from CEO or MD. For companies with turnovers exceeding several €100 million, they might be two levels away, and for businesses exceeding several billion, those who are four levels away can have suitable experience for acceptance.

In fact, you need those four weeks to gain the distance for reflection on your work and yourself. During this intense and challenging time, you will have a rare opportunity to develop a focused plan for your future – at work and in life. If you take all this into account, four weeks begins to look like a small investment with enormous returns, not just for you but also for your team and your organisation.

In short, not to disturb you, unless there’s an emergency. Calls and emails are distractions from the Advanced Management Programme’s intensive learning process. Those who disconnect themselves most effectively are generally those who learn most – and return with most to give their organisations. Your colleagues and direct reports have much to gain from coping without you too.

Well, we can only go on what past participants tell us. If you commit to the programme, the new perspectives gained from faculty and fellow participants will change your approach to the daily challenges you face. Your management thinking will be refreshed and your batteries recharged. And you’ll have a selection of ready-made new ideas and solutions, not to mention a much bigger network of international colleagues that you can call upon for future business challenges. It’s no wonder many people talk about the programme as the experience that changed their lives.

Can I return home at the weekends? Or can I bring my partner to INSEAD?

We’ve designed the four-week programme so that participants spend only three weekends away from home (it starts on a Monday evening, and closes on a Thursday evening). Deep reflection requires a retreat-like formula, in which participants can devote their full energies to the demands of the programme. Weekends are needed to relax after an intensive week – and to prepare for the learning in the week ahead. Nevertheless, we do open occasional events to partners, including the closing dinner. And many participants follow up the programme with a few days’ holiday in the region.