Tag Archives: systems thinking

“I used my work as a kind of petri dish for everything that I explored in the classroom”

Roscoe Williamson, Creative Strategy Director and Partner at MassiveMusic reflects on how the Central Saint Martins Birkbeck MBA has helped him shape his career path.

Picture of Roscoe

With a twelve-year career in the music industry under his belt, you might be surprised to hear that Roscoe studied Chemistry as an undergraduate. Its hard to know what you want to do with the rest of your life at 18 years old,he explains, Chemistry was a bit of a slog, so I had a real hunger to go back into education later in life, to learn and expand my horizons around topics that genuinely interest me.

Roscoe was keen to develop strategic leadership skills to advance his business, but coming from a creative industry, it was important to find a programme that valued creativity: I was particularly interested in bringing creativity into business and applying design and systems thinking to the corporate world. I was interested in a few courses that took a creative approach to business education, but I chose the Central Saint Martins Birkbeck MBA because it had both the innovative outlook and the solid finance and strategy side.

The MBA focuses on three curriculum units: Provocation and Enquiry; Entrepreneurship in Action; and Effecting Change: Collaboration in Practice. The eighteen-month programme culminates in an extended live project or dissertation. I enjoyed most aspects of the course and the exploratory learning style that was encouraged,explains Roscoe, The whole experience was like tasting a knowledge cake with lots of segments. I left behind those I didnt like so much, while my final research project allowed me to really get into what I liked the taste of.

Roscoes academic dissertation explores how organisations can nurture, scale and grow creativity and innovation. His findings point to ways in which organisational creativity can be led by individual behaviours, teams dynamics and organisational structures. Analysing organisational creativity and innovation from managerial, psychological and sociological perspectives allowed me to identify gaps between academia and practice and understand how to get the best of both,he explains.

Roscoes dissertation is in the final stages, but the changes in his work have been felt already: I wouldnt have enjoyed the course nearly as much if I hadnt been working at the same time. As well as becoming more efficient at managing my time, I used my work as a kind of petri dish for everything that I explored in the classroom. Ive been lucky to have a really supportive business partner who gave me time to devote to the MBA he says he has seen a change in me and the business already. Through the MBA, I got partially interested in strategy and realised strategic thinking is something that we needed more of.

Completing the MBA with a new job title of Creative Strategy Director, it seems that Roscoe has wasted no time in implementing what hes learned to his business. In the future, he plans to create a content hub, where he intends on sharing his leanings to the wider world.

Further Information:

Share