The programme is aimed at professionals who possess at least an undergraduate qualification and who are working in business, academia, national and local governments in Spain, and research centres. Places are limited to 25 participants for the 3 days programme and will be taught in English, for which each candidate must have a high level. Successful candidates will be offered a place on merit by a Selection Committee consisting of representatives of LSE and Fundación Ramón Areces who will meet by 28th February. 

Inscription

Persons wishing to register for this programme must make their registration online through this website, before 26th February. They should send the following documents by e-mail: i.medrano@lse.ac.uk. 

Introduction

Humans are world-builders. Our imagination reshapes our world through increasingly refined materials and processes, and never previously more so than during the first industrial revolution in the 18th and 19th centuries when steam power was harnessed to begin our long period of persistent growth. This led to the second industrial revolution from the late 19th century where growth and expansion led to not only to large geographically distributed organisations, but also to the emergence of management technologies and principles. The third industrial revolution witnessed from the 1970s an explosion in the use of information management and the modularisation of organisational processes, which has resulted in global supply-chains including widespread outsourcing of both manufacturing and administrative processes.

The fourth industrial revolution is based on the prolonged exponential growth in technological capabilities, and the extensive availability of structured and unstructured digital data. Breakthroughs in network technologies, mobile and ubiquitous computing, and cloud services have enabled the establishment of a generative innovation infrastructure supporting powerful digital platforms implementing multi-sided markets. Artificial intelligence finds increasing business usage, but also represents challenges. Robotics, self-driving cars, self-service convenience shops, block-chain infrastructures, cryptocurrencies, quantum computing, and many other digital phenomena are emerging. Rapid developments are not only promising exciting innovations, but also challenging our perceptions on the future of work. As we are embarking on a new world made up of a digital material of zero and ones, critical thinking is more necessary than ever, in order to appreciate and critically reflect on the choices ahead. The material of the fourth industrial revolution represents a flexibility in the reshaping of business arrangements that even experts find hard to predict. The resulting digital transformation of markets, public and private organisations, as well as our lives as citizens and consumers has just begun.

The aim of the course is to investigate emerging trends and to provide insights informing decisions. As a mature bullet-proof approach to deal with the threats and opportunities of digital transformation has yet to be found, organisations will each need to understand their own strategic options. Our aim over these three days is to provide both the theoretical understanding and the practical skills to undertake such search.