Areas of Focus
Throughout your two years at the Johnson School, we intentionally structure your program progression. During your orientation and first semester, you focus on building a solid foundation of business skills, leadership and knowledge. You start to customize your MBA in your second semester by choosing an immersion, an intense single-semester deep dive which centers the remainder of your first year around a specific industry or career path.
Your second year brings more options — in Ithaca, at Cornell Tech and around the world. And, as a Johnson School student, you have access to thousands of other courses at all the other Cornell colleges, schools and multidisciplinary centers. These include courses taught by nationally and internationally recognized experts in Cornell’s schools of law, engineering, public policy and healthcare and more.
Our Ithaca campus partners with Johnson Cornell Tech in New York City to offer either the Dual-Campus Track or a series of dual-campus weekend classes. For global experiences, you have the opportunity to join an International Study Trip over winter or spring break or to study abroad for a semester with one of our partner institutions through the international exchange program.
Electives
Throughout your MBA experience, electives bring variety and focus to your degree.
Electives work alongside your required core curriculum to customize your MBA. There are at least 80 electives for you right here at the Johnson School.
For a number of our MBA candidates, these opportunities lead to enrolling in a dual degree program, emerging from Cornell graduate studies as a JD/MBA or a MILR/MBA.
Second Year Areas of Focus
Optional Areas of Focus can help deepen your expertise and position you for career success in a specific field or industry.
With such a wide range of elective course choices, choosing focus areas in your second year provides talking points to explore in employment interviews. Being able to say, “I focused my curriculum around this topic,” can give your career options an extra boost with potential employers.
Declaring an area of focus means you have completed at least nine credit hours of corresponding elective courses in that area. The Johnson School defines 12 areas of focus to support your career:
- Asset Management/Investment Research
- Brand Management
- Consulting & Strategy
- Corporate Finance
- Data Modeling & Analytics
- Emerging Markets
- Entrepreneurship & Innovation
- Investment Banking
- Leadership & Ethics
- Private Equity & Venture Capital
- Sustainable Global Enterprise
- Technology Product Management
Areas of Focus Explained
Explore each focus area below. These choices give you a guide to supplement your chosen Immersion, fill knowledge gaps or prepare for a career in specific industries.