MS in Innovation

Discover more about Hybrid NUflex–a model designed to comply with density restrictions and provide flexibility to our faculty and students starting in Fall 2020.

Learn More

Our MS in Innovation is designed to help working professionals like you become innovation leaders, prepared to leverage data and technology to forge new strategic paths while mitigating risk with strong global supply chains. Here, you will learn the principles of innovation from multiple perspectives, including product and service development, financing innovation, go-to-market strategies, lean development, managing high-performance teams, and more.

Program Overview

Program Structure: Ten core courses
Class Schedule: 100% online with virtual meetings with your cohort
Time to Complete: 20 months

Explore the curriculum map

Unique Features

Our Entrepreneurial Ecosystem

Bring Products to Life

Gain Expertise in Areas That Include:

Next-generation product, system, and service design
Designing and leading innovation teams
Reinventing business processes and introducing change
Exploring new business models and ventures
Selling new products and services

Admissions

GMAT/GRE required? Northeastern has a test-optional policy for the 2021-2022 academic year and does not require a GMAT or GRE score to complete an application for admission. Under the new policy, you can decide whether to submit a GMAT or GRE score as part of your admission application. For more information, review our admissions policies.
English language proficiency: English proficiency, both written and verbal, is necessary for success in D’Amore-McKim classrooms. For more information, review our admissions policies.
Where do I apply? Apply using this application.
Interview required? By invitation.

Deadlines & Decisions

Find the deadlines and decision dates you need to know. Submit your application by the earliest date possible for priority consideration.

Please visit the Northeastern Student Financial Services page. Click the dropdown under “Graduate Programs” and you will find the rate next to D’Amore-McKim.

Apply for the MS in Innovation

Curriculum

We designed our online MS in Innovation to provide maximum convenience for working professionals. You will complete 30 credits, which represents ten courses. Each of your courses be seven weeks long. The MS in Innovation is a lockstep program; you’ll take all courses in sequence with your classmates. This structure means you’ll be part of a tight-knit group that will be a personal and professional resource for you for years to come.

Required Courses

Focuses on next-generation products, systems, and services with an integrated framework that applies market innovation, user-centered design, architectural and platform innovation, and business model innovation. Offers students an opportunity to apply these concepts to new product/service/business process innovation opportunities in their own organization with executive sponsorship and faculty guidance.
MGMT 6280 | 3 credits

Introduces the substantive and procedural aspects of marketing strategy and customer markets. Topics include how to identify target markets, how to leverage data and analyses to enhance the development of a marketing strategy, and how to develop knowledge of various techniques for uncovering customer needs/wants. Studies the importance of customer insights to business success. Offers students an opportunity to develop and implement a concept test.
MKTG 6280 | 3 credits

Covers the fundamental methods by which the financial successes and failures of business enterprises are measured and reported to management and external capital providers. Offers students an opportunity to become proficient at analyzing financial statement information in order to assess the effects of business decision making on firm performance. Addresses analytics focusing on the identification of capital to fund innovation initiatives in conjunction with metrics to measure the potential value associated with new product and service offerings. Seeks to help students understand how management decisions and innovation initiatives affect enterprise financial statements and shareholder perceptions of value creation.
ACCT 6280 | 3 credits

Reviews the product portfolio concept, examining the need for balanced portfolios and focusing on issues related to product proliferation and simplification. Discusses market-based pricing strategies, sales efforts, distribution, and communication in the context of enhancing the firm’s product position in the marketplace. Focuses on developing and executing sales. Explores business-to-business and business-to-customer strategies.
MKTG 6283 | 3 credits

Examines innovation in services and the internal management of business processes. Uses a framework of service/process redesign. Emphasizes strategic initiatives and key organizational change elements critical for improving services to customers; increasing profitability; and building long-term customer loyalty across multiple industry sectors, including information technology, healthcare, financial services, and government. Introduces the various strategic aspects of process improvement in the delivery of services, including managing change and the resulting impact on the organization, supply-chain management in the service industry, process improvement, overcoming organizational resistance, customer involvement, empowerment, and the role of leadership in managing operations. Through guided project work, offers students an opportunity to apply these concepts to services and internal business processes at their own organizations.
MGSC 6281 | 3 credits

Offers an immersion in corporate finance with a specific focus on the financing of innovation and growth at firms. Topics include analyzing and applying finance from the perspective of intrapreneurship as well as entrepreneurship.
FINA 6284 | 3 credits

Examines the leadership and managerial skills required for effectively managing multifunctional teams engaged in product, service, and business process innovation. Incorporates fieldwork, corporate visits, and other experiential learning opportunities. Explores strategies for recruiting, motivating, and retaining high-performance people. Introduces models for leading systematic innovative change within established corporate cultures, including understanding senior management attitudes toward innovation and how to create executive sponsors and mentors.
HRMG 6280 | 3 credits

Explores how corporate venturing and entrepreneurial teams can quickly and effectively bring new concepts to market. Demonstrates how small technical teams can quickly investigate opportunity spaces, develop and select concepts, and translate these into prototypes. Other topics include industrial design thinking, project teams, prototyping, and commercialization of design. Explores the challenges and solutions to managing a technology-based product within an established corporation and details frameworks on how innovative projects can be inexpensively tested and deployed within the organization.
ENTR 6217 | 3 credits

Reviews the key theories and tools needed to understand how technological change creates new markets and prompts new business models, how technology-based firms can outcompete rivals in fast-growing markets characterized by high uncertainty, and how the evolution of technology in an industry affects the type of firm capabilities needed to succeed over time.
ENTR 6222 | 3 credits

Analyzes whether, why, and how multibusiness corporations expand their operations into new business areas by questioning decisions to grow organically or through mechanisms such as acquisitions or alliances. Uses rigorous case-based discussions, expert readings, and major current events to discuss issues related to the choice of make, buy, or partner. Evaluates how these different corporate entrepreneurial strategies are used to help firms be more competitive and innovative.ENTR 5225 | 3 credits

*The curriculum is subject to change by D’Amore-McKim faculty. Please monitor for updates.