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Diploma projects – 2021

The autumn defense of diploma projects in the EMBA program in Russian at Kingston/RANEPA Business School (Faculty of International MBA Programs) was marked by a number of outstanding works in a variety of management fields. More than half of this year's graduates are winners and finalists of the Leaders of Russia competition, which is understandable: Kingston/RANEPA programs have been the choice of many finalists and winners for 4 years now. This year's diploma projects were distinguished by a variety of topics and directions, the unifying feature was their practical orientation, which was noted by the members of the Attestation Commission headed by Academician A.G. Aganbegyan.

Ruslan Zinnurov proposed a system of predictive indicators for strategic management of banking activities. The system assumes scenario planning and takes into account both the requirements of regulators and the changing conditions of the external and internal environment. The project was developed on the example of Zapsibkombank, but the created model is of interest to any bank that seeks to improve the quality of strategic management. The project manager was Yuri Volkov, a teacher with truly limitless knowledge in the field of financial management.

The choice of the concept of strategic development of an energy company is the topic of Taras Preobrazhensky's project. The novelty of the project is that the author transferred the practices adopted in the B2C market to the B2B segment, confirmed his developments with research and as a result proposed the "Energy-as-a-service" model for the development of the thermal business of Noyabrskenergoneft LLC, introduced the concepts of "energy as a product" and "energy service contact" - the model is aimed at to improve the value proposition for customers.


Anton Mashukov, one of the heads of the Department of Entrepreneurship Support of the city of Tobolsk, implemented the project mission "Development of polymer processing in the Russian Federation on the example of the city of Tobolsk". The work has practical value for the region, includes the development of federal and regional level measures for the development of the whole industry. The project has a high chance of being included in the investment program of the region. The scientific supervisor of the diploma project was Oleg Zhdanov, Director of the Competence Center of the Ministry of Energy.


A chronic shortage of labor resources in the presence of steadily growing business volumes, and all this in the conditions of the Far North is the context that formed the basis of Roman Dementiev's graduation project. As a result of a large-scale research, Roman proposed a new, "lightweight" model of the company's business processes, providing for the use of a variety of tools, including modern digital technologies to solve the problem of providing labor resources to a translogistic company in the Murmansk region.

It is gratifying that every year a conceptual project aimed at developing new management models is submitted for protection. This year it was the project of Yuri Olkhovsky, carried out under the direction of Alexey Verbetsky. "Overcoming the resistance of employees when setting non-linear and "impossible" tasks as a management technology" - this is the theme of the thesis. We all hear the phrase "It's impossible" from time to time. What is behind such statements? Is it possible to work with this? – such questions were asked by Yuri in his graduation project and, as a result of complex work, he proposed an interesting model of working with objections to understand the root causes, sources of resistance, building correct communication, business processes and motivation systems.

Grigory Sosnovsky touched upon another difficult topic in his project. The famous Pareto rule applied to company personnel: 20% of employees provide 80% of the result. Is this a given that you have to put up with? What should you do if your business directly depends on the performance of key employees, as, for example, in the investment company "BCS Ultima", where the proportion can reach 10/90? Is it possible to change this proportion? How to understand who is the best for your business, and what makes it the best? What does the real profile of the ideal employee look like? Where and how to look for such candidates? The answers to all these difficult questions are in Grigory's graduation project.

The object of Pavel Klepinin's thesis was the organization that Pavel founded and to which he devoted at least 10 years of his life - the IT&Digital Directors Club "I-IT-s". How should a mission-based dream organization develop? What should be the long-term strategy of a non-profit organization? How does the value proposition, the system of engagement, volunteer projects change? The project manager was Igor Mushakov, an IT industry professional with many years of experience, adding expertise and knowledge of the professional community.


Alexey Stepuro's work on the regional development strategy of the Far Eastern branch of the Rosselkhoznadzor was recognized as the best diploma project of this year. Cascading business targets "from the center" is not always effective, as it often does not take into account the specifics of the region. In his work, Alexey proposed and tested a methodology for adapting key business indicators to the specifics of the region. The project manager was Elena Dugina, an expert on strategic development with extensive experience working with regions. Alexey's speech, in addition to the strong substantive part, was extremely emotional, which did not leave anyone of the members of the Admissions Committee indifferent - it was felt that we were talking about a deeply painful and hard-suffering problem that has long been in need of a solution.

The defense of diploma projects at the EMBA program of the Kingston/RANEPA Business School is an event that is eagerly awaited and never disappoints. As one of the graduates said: "I did not plan to attend all the defenses, but it was impossible to leave and miss something, so interesting and meaningful were the projects of colleagues. I got a lot of intellectual pleasure and a lot of practical information that will definitely be useful to me!"