Focus Areas

This specialization prepares students for the global challenges that businesses face in the 21st century. The global marketplace today and in the future spans emerging markets, a world connected by social media, and rapid technological advancements, hand in hand with huge challenges relating to the environment and poverty. This specialization on global business covers how business strategy is formulated and implemented in the global arena in all its complexities. It also covers the role of ethics and corporate responsibility in a connected world as well as the role of business in addressing global challenges such as poverty and the environment. Thus, the specialization enables understanding of global business and how to pursue opportunities and confront challenges in this arena responsibly.
Learning outcomes
- Understand how businesses function in the global marketplace
- Make ethical decisions to run a responsible business in the global marketplace
- Understand the role of business in addressing global challenges such as poverty and the environment
- Understand how business can pursue opportunities and confront challenges in the complex global marketplace
Target audience
- Business professionals who seek professional development opportunities to upgrade their knowledge, skills, and abilities in global business
- Qualified professionals who value the high quality of a University of Illinois education
- The general public who, by acquiring valuable business knowledge, will be empowered to improve their current employment prospects
- Students in disciplines outside of business who seek to develop credentials in business
- Any learner pursuing an understanding of how businesses operate in a global environment
Courses:

In a VUCA World –a world characterized by Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, and Ambiguity – innovative leadership skills are required. Thinking differently and developing an entrepreneurial mindset are critical to thriving in such uncertain business environments so as to develop a strong point of view. This specialization is about inculcating this entrepreneurial mindset, i.e., questioning conventional wisdom, thinking creatively, working with resource constraints, maximizing the potential of human talent, and experimenting with multiple options. Learning to change the rules of the game by creating innovative value propositions and discovering new market positions for sustained competitive advantage are some of the actionable lessons in this specialization. This specialization will be of value to both aspiring and practicing entrepreneurs as well as employees in established firms who are interested in becoming innovative leaders in an interconnected world.
Learning outcomes
- Develop an entrepreneurial mindset
- Understand how to manage and innovate in uncertainty
- Assess the feasibility of a new venture and the diversity of challenges involved
- Think creatively in the arenas of entrepreneurship and innovation
- Think strategically about human capital
Target audience
- Aspiring and practicing entrepreneurs
- Employees in a startup or established firms interested in becoming innovative leaders by thinking differently
- Students in disciplines outside of business who seek to develop credentials in business
- Any learner pursuing an understanding of entrepreneurship and innovation
Courses:

This specialization covers the concepts, tools, and techniques needed to communicate with customers in a systematic and integrated way and to create effective, targeted promotional campaigns. When you complete the Digital Marketing Specialization, you will understand strategic marketing concepts and the tools required to make informed decisions and set the direction for your company, business unit, department, or product line in a digital ecosystem.
Learning outcomes
- Understand the application of marketing tools and strategies in the digital environment
- Employ marketing analytics to visualize and use data
- Understand how digital channels are used in marketing
Target audience
- Marketing professionals seeking professional development opportunities to upgrade their knowledge, skills, and abilities in the areas of digital marketing and marketing analytics
- The general public who, by acquiring valuable marketing skills, will be empowered to improve their current employment prospects
- Students in disciplines outside of business who seek to develop credentials in business
- Any learner pursuing an understanding of marketing in a digital environment

Our world has become increasingly digital, and business leaders need to make sense of the enormous amount of available data today. In order to make key strategic business decisions and leverage data as a competitive advantage, it is critical to understand how to draw key insights from this data. The Business Analytics specialization is targeted towards aspiring managers, senior managers, and business executives who wish to have a well-rounded knowledge of business analytics that integrates the areas of data science, analytics and business decision making.
The courses in this Specialization will focus on strategy, methods, tools, and applications that are widely used in firms and these are about:
- Data strategy at firms
- Reliable ways to collect, analyze, and visualize data–and utilize data in organizational decision making
- Understanding data modeling and predictive analytics at a high-level
- Learning basic methods of business analytics by working with different tools and data sets
- Learning to make informed business decisions via analytics across key functional areas in business such as finance, marketing, retail & supply chain management, and social media to enhance profitability and competitiveness.
Learning Outcomes
- Learn to develop a taxonomy of data analytic problem-solving strategies based on types of data, volume of data, and the nature of the business decision-making context that can serve you for the long term in your field of practice.
- Learn to identify business (functional) area gaps that can benefit from data-driven decision making, identify various stakeholders for a data analytic problem-solving approach, and develop a template for stakeholder interactions.
- Learn to combine business domain knowledge from decision makers with detailed steps that coordinate with the data analytics life cycle.
- Gain an understanding of the state-of-the-art data science techniques keeping in mind the corresponding business domains and functional situations where such techniques might find a home in organizations.