A high-powered team of academics and administrators from the Arthur Loc Jack Graduate School of Business of the University of the West Indies visited Guyana earlier this week to finalize plans for the launch here of the Graduate School’s Executive Masters in Business Administration.

Academic Director of the Graduate School Kamla Mungal told Stabroek Business during an interview on Wednesday that between 25-30 students – employees of local public and private sector entities – will commence the 18-month part-time MBA programme on May 1. In the interim, classes will be conducted at the Roraima Duke Lodge in Kingston.

Mungal told Stabroek Business that the start of what she described as a “localized” executive MBA programme “tailored to suit the needs of the local business community” comes after months of evaluation of “the Guyana environment” and contemplation of the kind of programme best suited to Guyana’s needs. “We have done our homework and we are ready to go,” Mungal said.

The Graduate School’s Executive Director and Professor of Strategy, Mexico-born Dr Miguel Carrillo told Stabroek Business that in recognition of the particular needs of Guyana students of the graduate school will also offer Portuguese. “This particular development seeks to recognize the emerging stronger economic trading links between Guyana and Brazil following the completion of the Takutu bridge. Apart from the teaching of Portuguese the Arthur Loc Jack Graduate School will also be recruiting two professors from Brazil to be part of our International Business curriculum here.”

Mungal, who is responsible for ensuring the delivery of the MBA programme as envisaged by the graduate school told Stabroek Business that highly qualified members of the faculty in Port of Spain will fly to Guyana on a regular basis to deliver the course components to students here.

The launch of the ‘customized’ executive MBA here removes the necessity for Guyanese students to travel to Trinidad and Tobago to pursue the programme. Several local business executives are graduates of the Arthur Loc Jack School of Business.

Carrillo explained that the MBA programme will seek to provide students with a theoretical understanding of the disciplines associated with business administration while infusing into the programme a body of practical knowledge that seeks to respond directly to the challenges confronting the entities for which they work. “We are seeking to teach best practices; we are seeking to offer ‘next’ practices. Our focus is on offering a state-of-the-art MBA programme that contributes to the qualitative improvement of Guyana’s human resource base,” Carrillo told Stabroek Business.

Meanwhile, Mungal said that the effective delivery of the MBA programme will depend on the support of local public and private sector officials who, given their knowledge of local conditions will be pressed into service as guest lecturers and discussion leaders for specific issues relating to the growth and development of the local private sector. Director of the school’s Internationalization Centre Nirmala Harrylall told Stabroek Business that the visiting delegation had already met several key private and public sector officials including Chairman of Demerara Distillers Ltd Yesu Persaud, Chairman of the Private Sector Commission Captain Gerry Gouveia, President of the George-town Chamber of Commerce Chandradat Chintamani, Head of the Presidential Secretariat Dr Roger Luncheon, Permanent Secretary in the Public Service Ministry  Dr NK Gopaul and Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Education Phulander Khandai.