Designed to facilitate student collaboration using authentic syndicate groups and easy-to-use digital learning tools, the MBS Online MBA has been crafted to be flexible while maintaining the same cohort experience for which the institution is famous.

“We now have a generation of native digital users who are of the age to do an MBA,” says Professor Jim Frederickson, the assistant dean of the MBS online program. “They live online and prefer to do things online.”

Online MBA course matches face-to-face offering

The MBS Online MBA strives to be no different to the traditional offerings, in terms of student experience and the quality of tuition. Classes are delivered by the same faculty as the face-to-face course, the curriculum is identical, and so are the fees.

“The course is about so much more than knowledge alone,” Frederickson says. “It’s about listening to a classmate bring their workplace into a class discussion and working with people from different industries on a real company project. It’s about late-night discussions with students or networking with alumni members.”

MBS has strived to replicate the best features of the traditional course while imbuing maximum flexibility, but how does it achieve this balance?

One example is a planned on-campus MBA Summit, to enable students to connect with classmates from both the online and face-to-face courses. The inaugural event will be run in June, and it’s hoped that subsequent get-togethers can be conducted around the country.

“We now have a generation of native digital users who are of the age to do an MBA. They live online and prefer to do things online.”

Professor Jim Frederickson, assistant dean of the MBS online program

“We will also have workshops and competitions where students can work together in person,” Frederickson says. “Over the course of the program, students will be expected to come to two or three of these.”

In addition, the online subjects incorporate discussion groups, in which students are not working on a ‘deliverable’ project but are interacting between themselves — and faculty members — in real time.

Collaborating with other emerging business leaders exposes students to different perspectives on their lessons. Prospective students are required to have a university degree and a minimum of two years of relevant work experience.

“This ensures the learnings are not just abstract and they can apply them,” Frederickson says. “We want students to bring into discussions their real experience and how their learnings play out in different work environments.”

Subject matter forms foundations

The MBS Online MBA consists of 17.5 subjects, delivered in seven-week blocks over 36 months.

The subjects are grouped as business foundations, marketing and operations, management and strategy, advanced business and finance, accounting and economics.

The MBS Online MBA welcomed its first intake in July last year, with the number of enrolments exceeding the school’s expectations.

“We can do so much more through collaboration and connection than we could ever do in isolation.”

Gold Coast-based MBA student Kaleb Roberts

Frederickson says the students are a diverse mix including engineers, nurses, financial professionals, school principals, business entrepreneurs and employees of not-for-profit organisations.

“One thing they have in common is they are all interested in improving their own lives and making a meaningful difference to the world.”

He says that enrolments for new online programs are typically from students who are geographically close to the school and broaden thereafter.

“We’re seeing the same thing. Our first intake predominantly was Victorian, but the last intake was 50 per cent interstate and from as far away as South Africa.”

Early feedback from students showed many were waiting for an online option from MBS, whose face-to-face MBA program is rated the best in Australia on the QS World University Rankings.

Reaching for ‘possibilities’

For Gold Coast-based current student Kaleb Roberts, enrolling in the MBS Online course was motivated by a desire to push himself and “find out what is possible in life”.

“The MBA is the next logical step for me and my family as we push for ‘possible’,” he says. “We did some research, and the MBS Online MBA seemed the most challenging with the most positive possibilities we could find.”

A sales enablement lead at digital marketer Localsearch, Roberts was impressed by the “straightforward” platforms and tools, real-world knowledge and level of support.

“I travel a lot for my work,” he says. “Once, I was stuck in the parking lot of a cane field in Mackay during floods on the phone to my student adviser, who gave me support there and then.”

Roberts adds the course has helped him avoid a small-town mentality and has “turned avenues into highways” for him both career-wise and personally.

“We can do so much more through collaboration and connection than we could ever do in isolation,” he says.

Learn more at studymbs.online.