Win a Cambridge MBA (Team of Students): MBA News

Local businesses and startups in the UK’s Cambridgeshire area could land themselves a team of five Cambridge MBA students as part of an annual project designed to provide a real-world opportunity to test market research skills.

More and more MBA students have been engaging in freelance work, where companies essentially ’rent’ an MBA, paying fees well below the going rate for a highly qualified management consultant.

However, the services of Cambridge MBA students come free of charge for successful applicants to the Cambridge Venture Project (CVP) – because the focus falls on providing the right kind of market research project for students to get their teeth into.

“We welcome proposals from local companies at all stages of development, who can offer a real and tangible market research need for the students to address. Projects typically look at financial, strategic and marketing implications of new products or ventures,” MBA projects manager at Cambridge Judge Business School, Sadia Cuthbert, told Cambridge News.

It seems there’s plenty of potential for interesting projects in the vicinity of Cambridge, with the city being dubbed ‘Silicon Fen’ as a consequence of its budding technology startup scene, as the BBC reports.

In search of specific market research needs

The challenge for the Cambridge MBA students is to grapple with a particular market research problem facing a local enterprise that lacks the limitless resources of a multinational, and to form clear and actionable recommendations to their host company.  

Teams work in a part-time consultancy capacity over a period of six weeks between October and December (alongside their Cambridge MBA classes), before presenting their conclusions to the Cambridge Judge community as well as their host company.   

Since its inception past participants have spoken highly of the experiential learning offered by the project, particularly in working within a small team of fellow classmates.

“Ultimately the success of the project comes as an added bonus to the hands on learning and experience gained,” said Tom Britton, a recent CVP participant.

Of course, it’s very much in the interests of the company or startup to take stock of what a fresh, impartial insight from highly motivated Cambridge MBA students can bring. But then, if they didn’t intend to act on the project’s findings then they wouldn’t be applying to secure the services of a free MBA team before this year’s deadline of September 9.