ISB

PGP MAX curriculum

Isb Pgp Max Curriculum

PGP MAX

Curriculum

PGP MAX

Post Graduate Programme in Management for Senior Executives

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Overview

The PGP MAX programme offers a holistic, rigorous and intensive learning experience where you learn not just from world-class faculty and industry leaders but also from each other and build a robust global professional network. Your 15-month academic journey comprises 24 courses structured around 8 cross-functional themes, executive coaching, and experiential learning opportunities, including our signature international immersion.

Integrate this rich learning experience with your continued career advancement through a carefully engineered format—12 week-long transformative campus immersions, spaced every six weeks (on an average), alternating between the Hyderabad and Mohali campuses. Our curriculum promises a fundamental shift in mindset, transforming how you approach challenges while enhancing your critical judgment, strategic thinking, and leadership capabilities to drive purposeful organisational change and global impact.

Cross Functional Learning

At the heart of PGP MAX are eight interconnected themes that form the architecture of executive leadership. Each theme builds upon foundational business principles while developing your capacity to lead with vision, drive innovation, create sustainable value, and make decisions that balance stakeholder interests in an increasingly interconnected global economy. 

Determine how economic and geopolitical contexts will impact your business strategy

Macro-Economics for Business Executives

Connects individual decisions with broader economic policies, helping executives navigate microeconomic dynamics and national landscapes. Develop a comprehensive understanding of global economic phenomena directly applicable to complex business contexts.

Government, Society and Business

Examines how political, social, and economic institutions shape business decisions. Explores institutional evolution and government-business relationships, teaching executives to balance private gain with public welfare in diverse policy environments.

Corporate Governance, Sustainable Business, and Ethics

Explores corporations as growth engines facing challenges like climate change. Examines stakeholder expectations and governance mechanisms, including boards and sustainability disclosures, developing informed perspectives on corporate purpose and accountability frameworks.

 

 

Gain a sound understanding of long-standing principles of marketing and business strategy customer-centricity.

Marketing Management

Develops abilities to create market-driven organisations through analytical frameworks for core strategies: segmentation, positioning, product development, value-based pricing, and distribution channel management—essential for capturing customer value in competitive environments.

Pricing Products and Services for Profitability

Provides frameworks for effective pricing decisions amid complex market factors. Enables methodologies for developing profitable strategies across technology, manufacturing, and services, enabling sophisticated approaches that maximise value while maintaining competitive advantage.

Marketing for Business Markets

Equips executives with frameworks to create value in B2B contexts. Explores strategies for overcoming commoditisation, managing offerings, and building customer relationships through real-world applications, digital transformation, and interaction with industry executives.

Maximise financial performance while creating value, managing risks, and addressing trade-offs in meeting the demands of investors, customers, employees and society.

Accounting Analysis and Information for Executives

Develops proficiency in financial accounting fundamentals. Teaches interpretation of balance sheets, income statements, and cash flow statements, building analytical capabilities through key performance ratios for informed strategic decision-making. 

Financial Analysis and Decision Making

Provides sophisticated tools for investment evaluation using discounted cash flow methodology. Develops competencies in risk quantification, securities valuation, and capital structure optimisation within a broader capital markets context.

Financial Strategies for Value Creation

Examines advanced strategies driving enterprise value. Explores the intersection between strategic vision and financial execution through frameworks for investments, divestitures, real options valuation, and M&A—enhancing long-term competitive advantage.

Establish structures, processes, operations and systems that foster transparency and accountability across the value chain.

Management of Organisations

Optimises organisational performance through evidence-based behavioural science examining motivation, influence, and leadership. Provides frameworks for mobilising human capital, executing change, and building high-performing teams that balance individual satisfaction with organisational effectiveness.

Global Operations Management

Equips executives with principles for optimising production systems across service and manufacturing sectors. Covers supply chain management, project execution, quality improvement, and decision sciences applicable to complex operational challenges in global environments.

Supply Chain Management

Develops capabilities in strategic supply chain design that aligns operational networks with business objectives. Master coordination techniques and analytical tools for optimising both product and service networks to create a sustainable competitive advantage. 

Craft overarching strategies and partnership ecosystems to drive growth and competitive value.

Competitive Strategy

Positions executives as strategic decision-makers, creating a sustainable competitive advantage. Analyses industry dynamics, strategic investments, global contexts, and resource allocation frameworks while building distinctive organisational capabilities and implementing effective strategic formulation. 

Micro-Economics for Business Executives

Explores consumer and firm decisions within markets, examining strategic firm behaviour and organisational incentive structures. Focuses on pricing strategies, market evolution, and competitive forces at both firm and national levels.

Organisational Growth Strategies

Examines strategic alliance formation across multiple formats. Master negotiation techniques essential for successful collaborations and methodologies for efficient market expansion despite resource constraints, including partner selection criteria and alliance governance.

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Personal Leadership Development Programme

The best leaders are those who stay true to their values. This programme helps you cultivate a leadership style rooted in self-awareness and personal growth while identifying and strengthening the unique qualities that define your leadership. You will undertake leadership development journeys tailored to your growth needs. The programme incorporates comprehensive evaluations with guidance from executive coaches, enhancing both interpersonal competencies and domain-specific expertise. This transformative experience encourages self-reflection, innovation, and collaboration, empowering you to lead with confidence, inspire others, and create lasting value for your organisation.

Leadership in Action

A core principle at the Indian School of Business (ISB) is the commitment to continually evolving its programs to meet the demands of the modern business landscape. This principle recognises that for today's senior executives like you, mastering the art of leadership requires moving beyond established theory and into the dynamic, often unpredictable, arena of real-world application. In alignment with this principle, the School has strategically enhanced the PGP MAX curriculum to create a more immersive and applied learning journey, reflecting the need for modern business leaders who can not only strategise but also execute with precision and impact. This evolution has resulted in two powerful, dedicated experiential components designed to bridge the crucial gap between knowing and doing.

Strategy is sharpest when applied under pressure. Action Week is the programme's answer to the classic challenge of translating boardroom theory into tangible results. This intensive, one-week on-campus module is engineered to hone your ability to lead through complexity and deliver outcomes. The week kicks off by building strong methodological foundation, immersing you in advanced principles of problem discovery and creative problem-solving grounded in design inquiry. This initial phase equips you with the framework to deconstruct complex challenges and identify innovative pathways to solutions.

Following this, in a fast-paced, 48-hour innovation sprint, you are confronted with a live, critical business challenge from a real company. This is not a case study, but a direct engagement where you will:

Test Ideas: Go beyond frameworks by applying strategic thinking to a genuine business problem, seeing the immediate implications of their decisions.

Sharpen Processes: Master a powerful cycle of problem discovery, data analysis, and solution design, refining a problem-solving methodology that can be deployed throughout a career.

Translate Theory into Impact: Work directly with company stakeholders and present solutions to a panel of industry experts. Participants learn to navigate ambiguity, influence key decision-makers, and communicate their vision with clarity and confidence.

The experience culminates in an exclusive session where you directly hear from these leaders after the presentations. This unique opportunity for candid conversation provides you with invaluable, firsthand industry perspective. Action Week is more than a module—it is your leadership proving ground where you emerge with a proven ability to drive change.

In today's interconnected economy, a global mindset is non-negotiable. The PGP MAX Global Immersion is thoughtfully designed to provide senior executives with an in-depth understanding of the forces shaping international business. Each year, the Business School partners with a top-tier academic institution in a key global economic region to explore critical themes of technology, innovation, and entrepreneurship.

This immersion is a highly experiential and curated journey that includes:

  • Classroom learning at a top-tier business school in a new geography
  • Direct and candid engagement with C-suite executives and influential industry leaders
  • Exclusive visits to innovative companies, from disruptive startups to established global giants in the region
  • A deep dive into the region's unique business ecosystem, political landscape, and cultural nuances.


This comprehensive immersion ensures you experience focused and cohesive learning, providing invaluable strategic insights and a powerful global network to draw upon as you lead your organisation into the future.

 

 

Graduate Degree Requirements  

The Post Graduate Programme in Management for Senior Executives (PGP MAX) delivers an EMBA-equivalent experience designed specifically for executives with demanding schedules. Our innovative modular structure—featuring one-week campus residencies every 4-6 weeks at ISB's Hyderabad and Mohali campuses—enables you to advance your capabilities without career interruption. 

To earn your PGP MAX degree, you must successfully complete 24 credits distributed across: 

  • Core Curriculum: 23 credits through twenty-three full-credit courses covering essential leadership and management domains 
  • Specialised Modules: 1 credit through two half-credit courses that deepen expertise in targeted areas 

Your 15-month journey encompasses preparatory coursework, eleven modules in India, and one international immersion—all thoughtfully integrated to provide both rigorous academic foundations and meaningful connection to ISB's vibrant professional community. 

This carefully engineered framework ensures you develop the strategic vision and global perspective required for enterprise leadership whilst maintaining professional momentum. 

Pedagogies

PGP MAX prepares you for real-world leadership. Through rigorous academics and practical experiences, you will develop essential leadership skills and tailor learning to your career goals.

Executives forge strategic and leadership capabilities through Action Week's "Build 48" innovation sprint, and global immersion at leading B-School, transforming classroom knowledge into decisive action skills amid real-world business challenges.

The programme delivers industry insights through curated speaker series and organised site visits where participants engage with thought leaders on international growth, corporate diversity, ethics, and consumer behaviour. Executives gain direct access to cutting-edge perspectives through events and interactions featuring distinguished business leaders.

Sharpen analytical thinking through immersion in real business dilemmas faced by global organisations, developing the critical reasoning capabilities and judgment essential for leadership in ambiguous, high-stakes situations.

Participants experience real-world business scenarios through advanced simulation software, developing leadership, teamwork, and management capabilities. These simulations bridge academic concepts with practical applications by solving industry-specific problems through theoretical frameworks.