MSc — 2025 entry International Events Management

This module introduces students to the study of ethics and applies this to tourism, transport, hospitality and events. Within the last decade significant attention has been paid to the issue of ethics and sustainability in these industries. Issues such as: corporate social responsibility, global reporting, ethical consumption, to name but a few, are becoming increasingly central to business practice. This module will offer students the opportunity to reflect upon their own understanding of ethics and corporate responsibility. It will introduce them to a range of theoretical approaches to understanding ethics and ethical responses to business situations, as well as provide the opportunity for in-depth reflection and critique on ‘real life’ scenarios. In so doing, this module adopts the University's curriculum framework, which aims to develop learners with strong Global and Cultural capabilities, Sustainability, Resourcefulness and Resilience while enhancing their Employability and Digital capabilities.

Using examples from around the world this module introduces the foundations of event portfolio planning and development. The module also adopts an experiential learning approach structured around a compulsory three night field trip during which students will visit destinations and meet key stakeholders involved with event planning, marketing and delivery. They will assess whether event portfolio planning is being effectively implemented and make suggestions for improvement where appropriate.Destination marketers and developers recognise that events attract tourists which can bring a number of benefits including: accelerated economic development, image enhancement, social cohesion and community capacity building. The recognition of these benefits has led destinations to add events to their existing event calendars, in some cases with minimal planning and co-ordination. The result being that the promised benefits are not realised in full and in some cases rivalry and conflicts of interest between organisations involved in delivering events have arisen. The event portfolio planning approach seeks to address such issues by fostering collaborative stakeholder networks which produce events that complement each other and deliver economic, social and environmental benefits.

Corporations, governments, entrepreneurs, and various organisations around the world are using data to extract patterns and generate insights to support strategic decision-making and create innovative solutions to business problems. This module will equip you with the fundamental concepts and tools needed to understand the emerging role of visual analytics in service organisations, will show you how to use a leading business intelligence platform -Tableau-, and will inform you how to best communicate your data with industry professionals for making better business decisions. Emphasis will be placed on applications, concepts, visualisation, interpretation, and communication of results, rather than theory and calculations.

Students will have the opportunity to learn about the different approaches that aim to answer the question: how do I plan, assess and implement a new business venture? Business plans are essential not just for the successful implementation of start-up ventures, but also for continued business growth, including strategic competitiveness. A good business plan underpins business success on all levels and becomes a major guideline to sound management practices. All students will find much value in the business principles inherent to the planning process, which will lead to an enhanced commercial understanding. This module's content and outcomes build solidly upon undergraduate business-related courses from level 4, 5 and 6, as well as any accumulated business experience. It doesn't just reiterate much of the theory previously learnt, but also applies it in a create and innovate way to emphasise creative business development, profitability, growth, and sustainability. It holistically addresses preferred business outcomes and brings all its components together. This module is also designed to give students an entrepreneurial- and industry-focused alternative to the traditional academic dissertation (MANM387).

This module aims to provide you with a number of service design techniques and models by which current and cutting-edge digital technologies can be designed into existing and new service journeys, therefore delivering service innovation through design and technology to create business value. You will be exposed to research-informed, practice-relevant teaching and a series of innovative design workshops using emerging service science and service logic thinking to help develop innovative digital solutions or improve current ones to address current managerial and sustainability issues.

Sustainability has become a major issue in contemporary service operations, including in the hospitality, tourism, transport, events, and related sectors. However, managers do not necessarily understand the specific aspects of sustainability which their business has an impact upon or is impacted by. Further, managers are not always familiar with the tools of sustainability assessment and have limited comprehension of how a robust sustainability audit can aid in reducing operational costs, improving corporate image, and increasing customer patronage. This module will introduce students into the array of sustainability-related issues that a business in hospitality, tourism, transport, or events may face and explain how these issues can be identified and assessed. The module will provide students with an opportunity to undertake a sustainability audit of a business and reflect upon the challenges of such audit's undertaking.

The dissertation is optional for all MSc programmes and is the final element of the programme, providing an opportunity for a sustained period of independent study and research. It allows students to concentrate on topics that are of particular interest to them and it draws upon a range of different aspects of the taught programme particularly the Research Methods module (MANM386). Students can build upon their knowledge and topics learnt from programme-specific modules studies in semester 1 to develop and define their research idea and questions. It also gives an opportunity for students to work independently with an individual supervisor. There are two forms of dissertations: An academic dissertation. This form of dissertation follows the standard academic pattern of identifying a topic arising from a gap in the literature and developing a methodology to explore this area in-depth. A business or applied dissertation. This form of dissertation starts with an emerging business problem, either provided by an industrial partner or with their co-operation in the process, and seeks to provide a research-based solution to or exploration of the problem. All forms of the dissertation seek to develop the same learning outcomes and follow the same assessment criteria. In some cases, taught modules, in addition to Research Methods, may be pre-requisites of taking a particular form of dissertation so that students are adequately prepared.

The dissertation is optional for all MSc programmes and is the final element of the programme, providing an opportunity for a sustained period of independent study and research. It allows students to concentrate on topics that are of particular interest to them and it draws upon a range of different aspects of the taught programme particularly the Research Methods module (MANM386). Students can build upon their knowledge and topics learnt from programme-specific modules studies in semester 1 to develop and define their research idea and questions. It also gives an opportunity for students to work independently with an individual supervisor. There are two forms of dissertations: An academic dissertation. This form of dissertation follows the standard academic pattern of identifying a topic arising from a gap in the literature and developing a methodology to explore this area in-depth. A business or applied dissertation. This form of dissertation starts with an emerging business problem, either provided by an industrial partner or with their co-operation in the process, and seeks to provide a research-based solution to or exploration of the problem. All forms of the dissertation seek to develop the same learning outcomes and follow the same assessment criteria. In some cases, taught modules, in addition to Research Methods, may be pre-requisites of taking a particular form of dissertation so that students are adequately prepared.