The 13 participants from École Supérieure des Affaires Beirut’s Executive Masters in Financial Management (XFM) programme travelled to Rotterdam with their programme manager and business development director Karim Jazzar. The professionals will add the specialisation ‘investment banking’ to their executive master qualification. XFM is a part-time programme at ESA, Beirut, which is one of RSM’s international partner schools.
Stock exchange
Highlights of the study trip included a visit to stock exchange Euronext Amsterdam, and a company visit to Nidera, a global commodity service and solutions provider for agricultural markets.
Participant John Georges Nacouzi, who is a senior corporate credit analyst at Crédit Libanais, said that his key academic learning points were the bonds solving, hedge funds, and the different perspectives. “The most challenging part was the busy schedule, and to find the balance between studying, doing our assignments and sightseeing,” said Nacouzi.
Strategic finance
Faculty members for the strategic finance and investment banking courses in this specialisation were Prof. Mike Ward and Chris Muller, MBA, from Gordon Institute of Business Science in Johannesburg, South Africa, also an RSM partner school.
“This specialisation at RSM has broadened my thinking towards complicated financial concepts, and provided me with the tools to simply create what I once perceived as impossible,” said participant Abed Al-amir Fawaz, financial reporting officer at Bank Audi in Beirut. “Although working on case studies with my group after our evening class was the most challenging thing we faced in this programme, it was worth it and full of teamwork spirit.”
