Course Descriptions
ETM 347U Introduction to Product Design
This course is geared to students interested in understanding products and their roles in our culture and lives, and experiencing some of what is involved in their design and production. Course will reflect a multidisciplinary approach and will enhance students’ teamwork experience, communication skills, and exposure to the various disciplines.
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ETM 356U Introduction to Human-Centered Design
This course will be renamed to "Introduction to Service Design". HCD is an approach that puts human needs, capabilities, and behaviors first, then designs to accommodate them. This course will build on the principles of Design Thinking to further students’ knowledge and hands-on practice applied to the creation of services that enhance human experiences. Expected preparation: Unst 222 (SINQ) before or concurrently.
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ETM 503 Thesis/ Dissertation
Culminating experience for master's and PhD students, respectively. Enrollment via By Arrangement only. Speak with your advisor before enrolling.
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ETM 504 Cooperative Education/ Internship
Enrollment via By Arrangement only. Speak with your advisor before enrolling.
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ETM 506 Special Projects
Capstone projects (4 credits) for the M.S. degree in Engineering Management can be taken instead of an Masters thesis (8 credits) or ETM 590 (4 credits) to satisfy curriculum requirements. The student must have graduate standing, must have completed at least six courses of the MS in ETM program, and must first discuss their proposed project with a faculty advisor of their choice (many students do their projects with their assigned advisor, but that is not a requirement). Students then conduct individual research on a project approved by the faculty advisor who supervises the work. Findings are presented in the form of a report after being accepted by the supervising advisor.
Capstone projects cannot be registered online like other courses, but require a "By Arrangement" form. Instructions on filling out the eBy-Arrangement form my be found here. Contact the ETM department office if you have questions.
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ETM 507 Seminar
The graduate seminar is a series of lectures on "up and coming" topics in the field of Engineering and Technology Management. Guest speakers are from academia and industry. The seminar covers recent developments in the field of ETM, gives insights into the department's research activities, and presents possible topics for independent studies or capstone projects. Strongly recommended for PhD students.
Please note: seminar credits are Pass/No Pass only and do not count towards ETM degrees or certificates. They do count towards full-time graduate status.
View the current Graduate Seminar schedule here.
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ETM 520 Management of Engineering and Technology
Study of fundamental concepts of engineering and technology management to provide the students with an in-depth understanding of the underlying principles of this discipline. Innovation process, technological change, motivation and leadership theories applicable to engineers and scientists, technological entrepreneurship, strategic management of technology and system interfaces in existing and emerging technologies are discussed in the course. Ongoing engineering and technology management research is critically evaluated in classroom discussions. Case studies and team projects are included.
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ETM 522 Communication and Team Building
Developing high performance teams for engineering- and technology-driven companies; fundamental concepts that make an effective team; building a high-performance team; the keys to high performance; converting risks into assets; the power of commitment and discipline, and constructive communication; getting results through team dynamics, creative problem solving, and interactive exercises.
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ETM 525 Strategic Planning
Critical issues in shaping the competitive strategy for the engineering- and technology-driven companies in a turbulent business environment; key steps and end results of the planning process; corporate mission; Key Result Areas (KRAs) and situational analysis including strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats in KRAs. Identifying planning assumptions, critical issues, setting objectives, formulating strategy. Leadership, organizational culture, and structure to support the implementation of a strategic plan as well as the strategic control systems. Case studies, presentations, term projects, teamwork, and interactive exercises.
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ETM 526 Strategic Management of Technology
Analyses of the structure and competitive dynamics of technology driven industries; resource and knowledge-based frameworks for competitive advantage, which are applied to technology driven industries; as well as a discussion of corporate, international and global strategies for technology driven ventures.
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ETM 527 Competitive Strategies in Technology Management
Provides perspectives, theories and methods used to analyze, formulate and implement competitive strategies in technology intensive industries. Provides a historical perspective on the evolution of competitive strategy theory and techniques including their foundations with key concepts and issues from strategic management thought leaders and present examples of the application of those concepts in business situations. Covers frameworks and tools used for strategy analysis, development and implementation.
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ETM 530 Decision Making
Decision and value theory concepts are applied to technical and management decisions under uncertainty. Multi-criteria decisions are analyzed. Subjective, judgmental decisions are quantified for expert decisions and conflict resolution in strategic decisions involving technological alternatives. Hierarchical decision modeling approach is introduced. Individual and aggregate decisions are measured. Decision discrepancies and group disagreements are evaluated. Case studies are included in the course.
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ETM 531 Technology Assessment & Acquisition
Fundamental concepts of assessing technologies including evaluation attributes and methodologies, impacts and impact relationships, and technology diffusion from individual, organizational, technical and market perspectives. Case studies, professional and research articles, and guest speakers from local companies included.
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ETM 532 Technology Forecasting
Fundamental concepts of technology forecasting. Differences between ordinary forecasting and technology forecasting, objectives of technology forecasting, tools and methods and their applications, selection of the right forecasting methodology, planning for technology forecasting, identifying attributes for forecasting, and managing technology forecasting. Topics are discussed through case studies, professional and research articles, guest speakers from local companies, and recently published books.
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ETM 534 Technology Roadmapping
Introduces Technology Roadmapping (TRM), which provides a structured approach for exploring and communicating the relationships between evolving and developing markets, products and technologies over time. Roadmaps allow technology developments to be integrated with business planning, and the impact of new technologies and market developments to be assessed. Roadmaps also seek to capture the environmental landscape, threats and opportunities for a particular group of stakeholders in a technology or application area.
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ETM 535 Advanced Engineering Economics
Economic evaluation of engineering and R&D projects is covered from the engineering management viewpoint. Time value of money, tax considerations, break-even analysis, sensitivity analysis, project evaluations under uncertainty, risk sharing, capital budgeting, financial ratios, and cost estimating techniques are studied. A business simulation game is used throughout the course to gain a better understanding of financial decision making.
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ETM 536 RDM: R&D Management
Managerial aspects of Research and Development (R&D) including special issues in managing research at national labs, university settings, and industry labs. Reviews evaluation methods and multi objective analysis used for R&D project selection. Development analyzed across the following venues: Roadmap Development, Eco system Development, Platform Development, Product Development, Technology Development, Prototype Development, Initiative Development. Focus on integration of research and development functions; project management challenges resulting from the uncertain nature of R&D; and the difficulties in measuring on-going R&D outputs.
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ETM 538 Decision Support Systems: Data Warehousing
Critical issues in developing data warehouse for decision support systems. Examines when and why an organization needs a data warehouse for decision support systems; how to organize data in a data warehouse; complications in designing a data warehouse system; and identifying resources.
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ETM 540 Operations Research
Covers the use of operations research techniques in making engineering and technology management decisions. The primary emphasis is placed on applying and interpreting linear and integer programming. Problem formulations, mathematical model building, the basic principles behind the Simplex algorithm, and multiple objective linear optimization are included in the course. Post-optimality analysis is studied from the viewpoint of technology management. Other operations research techniques such as queuing models will also be covered. The course includes a term project involving an actual operations problem.
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ETM 543 New Product Planning and Trend Foresight
Provides students with an understanding of the activities and challenges of managing the early stages of new product development, the so-called “fuzzy front-end”. It covers concepts, methods and tools for bridging the gap between strategic planning and new product development, for identifying opportunities, for generating and selecting product ideas, for developing product concepts, and for selecting new product development projects.
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ETM 544 Organizational Project Management
Covers the strategic components which drive the integration of initiatives, goals and projects within an organization. It involves the three primary domains of Portfolio, Program and Project Management. These domains support the management of business units, functions or company divisions and need to be in alignment for the business organization to be effective in pursuit of its vision. It includes coverage of macro level project management topics such as project management maturity models and the micro level such as agile project management.
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ETM 545 Project Management
Critical issues in the management of engineering and high technology projects; analysis of time, cost, performance, parameters from the organizational, people and resource perspectives; project planning, evaluation and selection, including project selection models; project and matrix organizations; project teams; scheduling and termination of projects. Case discussions and a term project are included in the course.
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ETM 546 Project Management Tools
An in-depth study and review of the major problems and analytical techniques used in the planning and implementing of major industrial projects. Specific focus on three primary areas: (1) time management: network scheduling techniques, including CPM/PERT, Critical Chain, etc., (2) cost: earned value analysis, and (3) risk: management techniques such as Monte Carlo analysis. An emphasis is placed on the integration of the techniques in the areas. The contingency approach to designing a project management toolbox based on the three areas of time, cost, and risk management is included.
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ETM 547 New Product Development
Examines complete product development process and key issues in new product development critical to developing profitable products in today’s technology oriented companies. Topics include technology integration, disruptive technologies, concurrent engineering, and creating innovative environments. Review of cases and published articles addressing these issues. Students develop a plan for a new product including risk assessments in areas such as manufacturing, design, and testing.
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ETM 549 Management of Technology Innovation
Describes and explains phenomena pertaining to technological innovation. Focus on the interplay between engineering/technology and the economical, cultural, psychological, social and technical aspects of the engineering environment. Provides technology managers a toolkit to make engineering and technical innovations successful. Also covers how engineering and technology management enables technological innovation.
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ETM 555 Technology Marketing
This course is designed to introduce students to the special issues faced by managers marketing technological products in markets characterized by rapid environmental change. Topics include an examination of the marketing/engineering/manufacturing interface, product innovation strategies, value-based pricing, buyer behavior and strategic selling, competitive market analysis and positioning, and distribution strategies. Emphasis is placed on strategies for marketing technology products in industrial markets.
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ETM 556 User-Centered Innovation
Introduction to the various strengths and weaknesses of approaches to innovation. Focuses on a customer-driven methodology and introduces the increasingly prominent role of design in creating memorable experience, and emotional connection with a product and/or a company.
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ETM 558 Engineering Financial Management
Teaches key concepts of financial and cost management and their linkage to overall business strategies for non-financial managers. Emphasizes the educational needs and perspective of functional and project managers in engineering and research.
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ETM 560 Total Quality Management
Critical principles and procedures of quality management in a competitive global environment; contemporary definitions of quality; quality in production/services; quality economics; quality philosophies; planning, organizing, and controlling for quality; human resource and empowerment strategies; and QC tools. Case studies, presentations, term projects, and teamwork.
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ETM 561 Technology Entrepreneurship
Examines how to start and grow a high technology company or high technology venture. Covers the complete venture creation process: key issues in high tech markets, startup finance, growth strategies and exit strategies. Guest lectures by practicing entrepreneurs, executives and financiers. Student teams create a technology startup business around technology that they develop, write a business plan and present their technology business idea to a financier.
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ETM 590 Engineering and Technology Management Synthesis
This is an alternate choice for the capstone course in the Master of Science in Engineering and Technology Management. It synthesizes the concepts and methodologies of engineering and technology management into an individual or group project. The research base for the project may come from any combination of the study areas covered in Engineering and Technology Management.
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