BSc (Hons) Events Management (with Foundation Year)

This module will provide you with effective personal and professional skills on which to base your academic study and professional careers in the tourism, hospitality and events industries and is an integral element of the transition to University learning. You will be learning the rules of academic study, acquiring and developing skills to support both your academic and professional careers.

The Experience Economy, comprising the tourism, hospitality and events industries, has significant positive and negative effects on places. This module introduces the Experience Economy via a set of in-depth case studies, focusing on specific places. In each case study you will be introduced to a specific Experience Economy example, including at least one international event, one tourism destination and one hospitality industry case.

The module will include short field trips and site visits, some of them being virtual, including at least one aspect of Oxford’s significant visitor economy, and one international case.

This module will introduce you to the theoretical and contextual aspects of developing and planning memorable experiences, preparing you to organise your first experience industry products. The module will also give you the opportunity to explore planning for sustainable and responsible practice.

You'll be introduced to the practical aspects of designing and delivering live experiences Building your knowledge gained on the module Developing and Planning Experiences and you'll focus on developing understanding of the links between strategy, decisions and outcomes for an experience and its stakeholders.

This module has three phases:

• theoretical underpinning
• participation in a practical experience delivery
• and reflection and evaluation of your experience and learning.

You'll also have the opportunity to explore the effects of a range of alternative decisions within a dynamic business environment. Linking your personal development to professional standards frameworks and in doing so enhancing your
employability.

You'll develop your data literacy skills, focusing on practical analytics tool applications (like Excel) to prepare you for data driven business environments. You'll learn to efficiently organise, process, analyse and visualise business data, and gain essential numerical, modelling and IT skills. These skills are taught in a business and problem-oriented way, using simplified business problems, and combining several skills for each problem. As you progress through the module you'll master core data literacy skills and be able to explore data trends relevant to real-world business contexts.

This modules features an introduction to the dynamic world of hospitality, tourism and events industries in a global context. You'll understand the composition, scale and scope of the sector.

You'll examine the context of this industry through an analysis of historic, current and anticipated global trends. You'll use global frameworks, such as UN Global Compact, to analyse the nature of business practice, the impact it has on the environment and the impact of the external environment on the changing nature of events. This module begins the journey of becoming a responsible leader in events management.

Examples and case studies are drawn from a wide range of geographical situations - local, regional, national and international.

You'll look at fundamental concepts and techniques of experience marketing, and take a practical focus on the business realities of the global hospitality, tourism, and events sectors.

You'll develop an understanding of how organisations design, deliver, and responsibly market engaging experiences, and you'll be exploring how value is ethically created through memorable customer journeys, data-informed insights, and adaptive strategies across international contexts. You'll do this through case studies, industry scenarios and critical reflection, and you'll develop your skills in positioning, promoting, and sustaining experiences in competitive environments. Which will help you to prepare for roles that require creativity, innovation, and customer-focused thinking. The theoretical foundations and toolkits covered here serve as essential building blocks for academic and professional development, directly supporting your first-year experiential learning modules.

You'll gain a foundation of knowledge in how international tourism, hospitality and event organisations are managed. You'll be introduced to the core principles of management and organisational behaviour within international tourism, hospitality and event sectors. You priorities of learning include:

• exploring key management theories
• foundational financial concepts
• organisational behaviour frameworks
• and the ethical and corporate social responsibility considerations that shape managerial decision-making in these sectors.

Together, these concepts and analytical frameworks provide you with essential building blocks for your academic progression, enriching your experiences and supporting your learning across other modules, particularly the first-year experiential learning modules.

You’ll continue to develop skills required for planning, managing and coordinating all aspects involved in the staging of a live sustainable event at a professional level.

You’ll learn how to produce events that respond to public policy, regulation and global industry standards. You’ll learn how to:

• identify and engage key stakeholders
• identify, manage and mitigate risk
• establish key targets and performance indicators
• monitor and manage progress indicators
• deal with the impact of change on the project
• and develop and implement post evaluation (environmental, social and economic) to capture learning and, if necessary, an exit and legacy strategy.

You’ll develop and build the skills necessary to gain employment in the events management industry as you recruit to the roles for the project. You’ll analyse and evaluate job roles that match your existing skill sets and identify how to develop new skills to enhance your employability and plan for your career development.

This module will help you build on your first year learning. You’ll be able to identify and analyse the characteristics of managing people in Tourism, Hospitality and Events labour markets. Also, you’ll gain knowledge of theory and practices associated with managing culturally diverse people and workforces in these sectors. You’ll evaluate critically contemporary people management theoretical approaches utilising a range of independently researched evidence to support your arguments.

You’ll analyse relevant theoretical propositions for international Tourism,Hospitality and Events sectors. To build your understanding of managing people in these sectors. And you’ll also engage with current debates concerning the diversity and inclusion, culture and cultural differences and ethical management of diverse workforces to develop your key management skills in Tourism, Hospitality and Events.

Building on your experience on the course so far and to prepare you for employment. This module will help you to reflect on your experience and for you to become increasingly self-aware about the skills necessary to gain employment in the tourism, hospitality and events management industry as you work through your live projects.

You'll analyse and evaluate the tourism, hospitality and events industry and a variety of job roles. You'll assess your existing skill sets and identify how to develop new skills to enhance your employability and plan for career development while understanding how to develop an effective brand, both online and in person. You'll improve your awareness of the industry, build confidence in strengths and identify areas for your development, while preparing you for future employability such as vacation work, internships, placement or paid part time or full-time roles across the industry.

This is your introduction to the core principles of marketing within the current digital environment. You’ll develop an understanding of the current changes in digital marketplaces and the need to adapt Tourism, Hospitality or Event (THE) products and services for those markets. Also you’ll explore the discipline of Digital Marketing in the wider context of service industries’ marketing activities combining theoretical foundations with a hands-on approach to the topic. You’ll have the opportunity to work in teams to audit an existing THE brand and/or develop your own team brand, draft a marketing plan and engage in the creation of a realistic digital marketing campaign.

This module will help you prepare for your final year compulsory modules and will also prepare you for other advanced modules you’ll study.

Through this module you’ll develop your evidence-based research skills and techniques. Along with those skills and techniques of problem definition, the collection, analysis and critical evaluation of data (both secondary and primary). By the end of the module you’ll be able to argue and present a case based on evidence and analysis to an audience.

This module is designed to provide practical guidance and support in undertaking a placement search, preparing for the placement experience, and succeeding in the modern workplace. Throughout the module, you will develop critical self-awareness and personal literacy skills, enabling you to self-reflect on your own strengths and weaknesses and target your placement search effectively. Additionally, you will also explore methods of effective and targeted placement search, increasing your chances of securing a placement.

In summary, this module is an essential component of your employability journey. By integrating with co-curricular activities, the module provides a holistic approach to employability, ensuring that students have a broad range of skills and experiences to draw upon in their future careers.

You’ll look at the environmental sustainability challenges facing society and businesses. You’ll discuss key environmental issues such as:

• global warming
• pollution
• biodiversity loss
• freshwater depletion.

You'll also look at the role of business in causing, as well as responding to, such issues.

You’ll explore macro (economic, policy, governance) as well as micro (organisational and individual) perspectives. You’ll also be introduced to a variety of stakeholder perspectives and frameworks for evaluating business responses. Through the module you’ll develop your key competencies for sustainability that are endorsed by UNESCO (2017) and the QAA/Advance HE (2021). The competencies are:

• systems thinking
• anticipatory thinking
• normative competency
• strategic thinking
• collaborative competency
• critical thinking
• self-awareness
• integrated problem-solving competency.

You'll get to grips with social media marketing. You'll learn how and why it has become one of the most important tools used by businesses to find and engage with customers and the increasingly key role that Influencer Marketing plays. Through both a strategic and practical approach, you will build a Social Media and Influencer Marketing Plan for a real business. This will help you to gain an understanding of:

• the changing face of Social Media and Influencer Marketing
• how to choose and find influencers
• how to use influencers to improve customer engagement and ultimately drive sales.

Explore Oxford's historical and modern role as a literary and media hub. With more authors per square mile than anywhere else in the world, and the location of many media companies and professionals, Oxford has a unique creative cluster that warrants review and analysis.

Build your unrivalled media network through Oxford Brookes' circle of dynamic and diverse media professionals, and explore critical issues and key themes encompassing the global media world as it is today.

By the end of this module, you'll have a firm understanding of Oxford's unparalleled literary history, and how you can apply this knowledge to building your own creative connections.

Managing revenue effectively is of ultimate importance to maximising value and profit for the Hospitality, Tourism and Event industry. Management of revenue involves a co-ordinated application of a range of financial, operational and marketing skills, ranging from:

• price determination
• demand forecasting
• customer value perception
• inventory control
• to channel distribution management.

On this module you’ll examine all these topics and it will give you a holistic insight into Revenue Management from a combined financial and customer-centric approach. Your study will help prepare you for a fast-tracked career in the hospitality industry, in the Revenue Management area. You’ll finish this module equipped with the financial knowledge to tackle your final year financial modules.

You’ll explore the socio-cultural origins and place in society of a range of celebratory events, such as:

• weddings
• anniversaries
• celebrations of birth and death.

You’ll critically review the religious, ethnic and social associations of such events in various settings. Also you’ll apply the key practical and creative requirements of designing and staging such events.

Through your studies you’ll develop core events skills like taking a client brief, managing stakeholders and events communications. You’ll have the opportunity to work with a live client brief. Practising your core skills you’ll acknowledge the cultural expectations of the client, and reflect on difference and opportunity, to celebrate diversity.

You'll explore, critically analyses and applies theories, models and frameworks of tourist consumer behaviour to the specific behaviour of consumers for different sub-sectors of the tourism, hospitality and events (THE) industries.

You'll examine consumer behaviour before, during and after a tourism, hospitality or events experience and interprets its relevancy for onward management decisions. The theories, models and frameworks used will focus on consumer behaviour as understood in the discipline of marketing but will also draw from the social sciences, that investigate THE consumer behaviour.

You'll evaluate relevant material from academic research, practitioner reports and websites and documents, traditional news media pieces, and the tourist voice as expressed via social media and to arrive at a series of workable recommendations.

A novel idea underpinned by a business that provides focus and credibility is the starting point of every innovative business. You'll be introduced to theoretical and practical aspects of a business model, business planning, and its fundamental importance in the progression of innovative business ideas from concept to implementation. You'll focus on developing a business plan of a new enterprise within an existing firm. This will help you to evaluate feasibility of a proposed enterprising venture within a business planning framework and familiarise you with the issues encountered in managing enterprises.

This is an opportunity for you to study Business topics abroad in order to experience a different national, educational and business culture and to build on your knowledge, understanding, skills and competencies you have acquired during the earlier part of your course. This will help you to develop those skills to a higher level and to acquire new skills. All the topics studied will be relevant to your degree.

You will undertake an international study exchange at a university outside the UK, arranged by the University’s exchanges office. This international study exchange lasts for one academic year and is taken after the conclusion of your second year of studies (Level 5).

You can spend your third year on a work placement. This is a great opportunity to enhance your CV; preparing you for future employment. You will gain commercial and practical experience and often students are offered graduate positions by their placement employer.

During the placement year itself students are supported by an assigned Placement Tutor who remains in regular contact with the student and their line manager. WAVES also supports students in identifying volunteering or internship opportunities. Voluntary work associated with local community events, for example, provide additional opportunity for the development of students’ employability skills.

Recently, students have enjoyed inspiring and intellectually challenging positions at Disney, Harley Davidson, BMW, Dyson, Sharky and George, GlaxoSmithKline, Nestlé and PayPal. Learn more about how Oxford Brookes Business School supports students secure a work placement.

This 24-week placement is your opportunity to develop your employability and enterprise skills, within the UK or Europe. You will gain first-hand knowledge and experience of making applications to, and working in, a placement role. You will set your work-based targets and reflect upon your success in your placement role. At the end of the placement, you will make a presentation to your line manager and placement tutor which summarises the knowledge and skills you have developed on your placement.

This module aims to begin to develop Pre-Master’s students’ academic reading, research and critical thinking skills in preparation for postgraduate study and to support the development of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) literacy skills.

The three main purposes of the module are to:

1. begin to develop academic reading skills to prepare for postgraduate study in the UK
2. to begin to develop skills in locating, evaluating and using appropriate sources with appropriate citation, and
3. to begin to develop the skill of responding critically to the content and context of reading.

You will be challenged to advance your reflective skills and reassess the personal ability to effectively manage a diverse range of relationships. Also you’ll look at authentic leadership skills within the international hospitality and tourism industries.

By the end of the module, you will have developed:

• leadership knowledge
• competencies and skills by using your own work
• university and/or community-based experiences to explore key relationships
• professional sector competencies
• and how to evaluate contemporary leadership challenges.

The challenges faced by society today are placing new demands upon a new generation of leaders for whom ‘global responsibility’ will be a central component for how they lead.

This module uses the traditional leadership theory to explore the leadership practices in multiple settings, sectors and societies. Students focus on the theme of responsible leadership, emphasising on collaborative relationships with stakeholders. Students emerge capable to critically analyse theories of leadership, understanding the limitations and strengths of various theoretical propositions. More importantly, they join a community of moral and ethical leaders.

This module will focus on the analytical aspects of a range of current and emerging issues in the events industry through the lived experience of events practitioners. Students undertake a comprehensive analysis of how industry trends are developing and what these changes mean for a range of key stakeholders and the wider network that supports the events industry.

Through this Research Project you’ll have the opportunity to conduct sustained, self-directed, independent work through an in-depth study of a hospitality or tourism-related topic where you can analyse theory, evaluate it and apply it to examining practice.

You will build skills in thinking logically and critically about complex managerial issues that hospitality organisations face today and structure solutions with a data-driven approach.

You’ll develop your understanding of the content, importance and relevance of business analytics and data visualisation in business decision-making with a focus on the hospitality and tourism industry.

You will gain knowledge of the key concepts and methods combined with extensive opportunities to develop your hands-on skills for applying business analytics and data visualisation to managerial decision-making.

You will be exposed to what is involved in being a successful entrepreneur in the Hospitality and Tourism industry sectors. Also you’ll learn techniques to foster creativity and innovation.

You’ll undertake informed reflection on your entrepreneurial predispositions and have the opportunity to work up and present an idea for your own potential venture to a panel of expert entrepreneurs.

Explore how the assets of a hospitality and tourism organisation are effectively managed on behalf of internal and external stakeholders and key techniques of financial decision-making for hospitality and tourism organisations. Also, you will get the opportunity to analyse and interpret the Annual Report and Accounts of a publically listed Hospitality or Tourism business.

You’ll look at hospitality and tourism financial reports, where you build your skills and knowledge of:

• uniform accounting systems
• responsibility accounting
• hotel industry studies and comparative analysis.
• content and interpretation of annual reports of hospitality and tourism businesses
• hotel management contracts
• franchising
• business valuation
• capital project appraisal methods
• responsibilities of the asset manager within the owner/operator context
• contemporary financial issues.

You’ll have the opportunity to explore complex relationships between food and drink, individuals and societies.You will build your critical thinking skills and be able to argue and present about the extensive implications of food and drink-related practices for society.

You’ll analyse a variety of factors that shape these relationships and examine the:

• consequences for health
• environment
• distinctiveness of cultures
• cohesiveness of communities.

You will explore factors affecting the decisions related to the international business strategies of hospitality and tourism (H and T) organisations. You’ll also learn methods to evaluate various international expansion modes considering the political, economic and socio-cultural environments of potential destinations.

You’ll build appreciation of the risks associated with doing business in international markets by addressing transnational differences (with a particular focus on emerging markets) that affect the strategy, performance, and value of international H and T organisations.

You’ll have the oppportunity to critically reflect on the impacts of a globalised brand or brands on local markets and consider ethical, social and environmental effects of a company’s decision to expand internationally. You’ll also look at models for organising and managing an international network of operations and how to coordinate knowledge transfer across borders.

You will explore the fundamental techniques and tools to analyse and improve operational capabilities of hospitality organisations. You will learn about commonly occurring application problems such as:

• hotel/restaurant inventory control
• facility layout and workflow problems
• process and bottleneck analysis.

Also you’ll look at optimisation models that support hospitality procurement and purchasing functions, including labour productivity analysis and regulating waiting times.

By the end of this module you will have explored various case studies of the role of operations in building the competitive strengths of an organisation and in fulfilling its ultimate goal of creating value and delivering customer satisfaction.

This module is also a 24-week work-based learning opportunity for you to develop your employability and enterprise skills. As on the other modules, you will have the opportunity to obtain first-hand knowledge and experience of making applications to, and working in, a placement role. This could include employment, volunteer work experience or undertaking a consultancy type project.

Before your work-based role begins, you will agree a brief and set work based targets allowing you to reflect upon your success in your placement role. At the end of the placement, you will make a presentation to your line manager and placement tutor which summarises the knowledge and skills you have developed on your placement.

You’ll focus on the study of the range of nature and type of impacts associated with tourism and tourists on the:

• Environment
• Economy
• Society.

Including approaches to impact assessment and management to ensure that the tourism and hospitality industry benefits from them.