Executive programme

Let Mälardalen University (MDU) be your sparring partner in creating agile skills strategies. We dare to challenge – and to be challenged.

Today, bridging the skills gap is a key challenge for many executives. The education system has been upgraded with dynamic skills supply strategies such as reskilling, upskilling, lifelong learning, and talent management to meet the needs for flexibility and speed. Let MDU be your sparring partner in creating agile skills strategies with several courses and workshops aimed at managers and specialists in senior positions.

Our contract education has been developed in collaboration with companies and public organisations based on concrete skills challenges and real needs. The content of these courses applies to your business, and it rests on a combination of research, experience, and knowledge from both the private and the public sectors. We have done this by exploring new organisational challenges related for instance to sustainability, transformational leadership and digitalized management.

This programme will help you gain the know-how, perspectives, and inspiration you need to excel in developing and implementing new business opportunities, strategies, and ways to manage and lead your company. More information on our research areas can be found in the links below:

We usually say that collaboration is part of our University’s DNA. Therefore, we carry out a large number of strategic collaboration projects with companies from the private and public sectors that are continuously evolving. MDU hosts two crucial collaboration platforms that run various projects in partnership with different organisations, municipalities, and authorities, regional as well as global. See the below links to our collaboration platforms:

We offer different formats for our programmes that include a “one-day" workshop to extended programmes that run over several days. The educational efforts can be either credit-bearing or without academic credits, depending on the scope and level of ambition of our clients.

We aspire to be a conversational partner in skills supply and competence development for our potential clients, bringing the latest research to professionals. To make the research applicable to organisations, a practical approach is also needed. We achieve this by working collaboratively with several public and private companies.

We are change makers – we encourage high ambitions and daring attitudes that are unleashed by the use of science-based processes for organisational and skills development in order to bridge the skills gap.

The programme is aimed at managers

The programme is aimed at managers in both private companies and public sector, international as well as domestic, with the purpose of strengthening your company with regard to employee empowerment, cultural insights and business performance.

What the programme will provide you with

• Scientifically based models, tools, and approaches to grasp the new environment in which your company operates, building new capabilities and learning new ways to operate.
• A potential network to benefit your own business.
• The ability to discover new business opportunities by revisiting the strategic analysis to find a balance to exploit the known and explore the unknown.
• Knowledge and security in your current and future leadership roles, offering you new perspectives and insights and creating a new mindset to successfully lead the transformation.

We can tailor the training programme to suit your unique situation and requirements

Our executive leadership programme is designed for you and by you, making it easier for managers to transfer what they have learnt directly to their daily work. Our scientifically-based development method is made up of the following stages:

Analysis

With your goals in mind, we examine the needs of your company through interviews and meetings. In this way, we can identify key focus areas to improve leadership performance. Moreover, this helps us to get to know the participants on the programme better and to understand their current situation and challenges.

Design

Based on what we found out during the analysis, we can then design your customised leadership programme. We have a flexible approach where we decide together with you which modules, sessions, and workshops to include in your programme. Having said that, there are two principles on which we never compromise:

Research-based education

As a university, we contribute to the field of management education by considering different, and sometimes contradictory, perspectives of management practices.

This enables us to be your sparring partner to navigate the complexities inherent in management practices. Our aim is to nurture responsible management in organizations and society by combining theoretical and practical knowledge.

Practice-based learning

Our method for creating effective leadership programmes is based on knowledge transfer to reality. Through a case study (which can be created by us or can be a real case scenario taken from your organisation), you will experience leadership situations through practical exercises. In addition, you can reflect on and exchange experiences with one another, which gives you the opportunity to share new knowledge and skills. In a safe learning environment, managers can discuss their own experiences and give feedback. They will be given structured tasks to apply their new knowledge and skills in real life. The information is designed to create immediate value for managers and their teams.

Programme delivery

There are various things to consider when creating your leadership programme.

On-site, digital, or hybrid

You can take part in the programme at the office, at a conference facility, or online. Today, we prefer to conduct leadership programmes in a combination of these environments. This will depend on the programme's content, cost structures, and your organisation’s conditions.

E-learning

We can design your leadership programme in combination with company-adapted e-learning courses. You will get a leadership programme that mixes excellent training in the classroom with modern e-learning.

Programme subjects

All the courses are different. But there are some focus areas in our tailored management training that we believe are relevant to current managerial challenges. Some of these areas are:

• International Business Management
• Business Relations and partnership
• AI and Marketing, AI and HRM
• Skills supply
• Change management
• Brand strategy
• Integrating sustainability
• Intrapreneurship
• Sustainable entrepreneurship
• Managing the digital transformation
• Project management
• Talent management
• HR management (Trust, Psychological Safety)
• Responsibility for AI
• Organising cybersecurity
• Business intelligence
• Environmental scanning and analysis