Managing Innovation Strategically
A 2-day executive education programme designed to help senior executives and strategy managers generate greater levels of innovation through innovative strategies, AI and disruptive business models.
Upcoming programmes
Format:
Dates:
Duration:
Fees:
Face-to-face
6-7 Jul 2026
2 days
£3,800 + VAT
Upcoming programmes
Format:
Face-to-face
Dates:
6-7 Jul 2026
Duration:
2 days
Fees:
£3,800 + VAT
Overview
Where do innovative ideas come from? Explore the foundations of innovation and discover how disruptive business models can become valuable corporate assets.
Operationalising innovation and selecting the right innovation projects are increasingly vital skills. The Cambridge Judge Business School 2-day programme, Managing Innovation Strategically, equips participants with the tools and frameworks to drive greater creativity and impact within their organisations. Gain insights into why businesses often struggle with innovation and learn strategies to break down organisational barriers. The programme also explores how disruptive innovation, like AI, can create significant competitive advantages. Discover how AI can unlock new opportunities, improve decision-making, and enhance agility, helping organisations pivot and thrive in an ever-changing business landscape.
Benefits and career impact
Learn how to harness creativity to gain a critical competitor advantage.
- Develop your ability to manage innovation.
- Understand the factors required to support creativity and innovation in your teams and in your workplace.
- Collaborate with leading members of the University of Cambridge and experience rigorous academic research combined with real-world, professional expertise.
- Become part of an international and ambitious peer support network.
- Receive a certificate of completion from Cambridge Judge Business School Executive Education.
- Learn the frameworks and processes to organise and implement innovation within your organisation.
- Ensure your team can apply innovation, adapt to change and secure competitive advantage for your organisation.
- Understand the factors needed to support creativity and innovation in your employees.

I really enjoyed the Managing Innovation Strategically course; many useful takeaways and food for thought! The content was very engaging, the lecturers managed to make the course very interactive even in this virtual environment, and the discussion with the rest of the group was extremely insightful in terms of what other companies and industries out there are doing. Now time to figure out how to apply everything!

This programme is certified by the CPD Certification Service. It may be applicable to individuals who are members of, or are associated with, UK-based professional bodies.
Programme content
Cover 4 modules across 2 full days, delving deep into the opportunities and challenges innovation creates.
Module 1: Why innovation is hard to achieve
- Understand the strategic role of innovation in your organisation and how AI can support it in a responsible way.
- Explore the systemic challenges of creating new value, including people, structure, culture, and incentives.
- Conduct a diagnostic to identify the most critical bottlenecks across these dimensions.
- Assess the key elements of strategic innovation capability.
Module 2: Disruptive innovation and capturing value from innovation
- Explore different strategic approaches to innovation, including incremental, disruptive, and platform models.
- Learn from transformative and disruptive companies, mapping successes and failures to your organisation’s strategy.
- Understand how leading organisations approach innovation strategically.
- Develop an innovation strategy that enables your organisation to create and capture value.
Module 3: Innovation as a process – Part I: Managing the creative organisation
- Apply a process-based diagnostic framework to assess corporate innovation.
- Recognise the role of people, structure, culture, and processes in driving idea generation.
- Identify barriers to building a more innovative culture and learn how to overcome them.
Module 4: Innovation as a process – Part II: Aligning strategy with implementation
- Explore the challenges of selecting the right portfolio of innovations to support your strategy.
- Understand the limitations of existing tools and methods for managing innovation portfolios.
- Apply the Cambridge Judge Business School Innovation Basket approach to prioritise and balance initiatives.

How you learn: Face-to-face
Enjoy 2 inspirational days in the historic and beautiful city of Cambridge, a world-renowned centre of cutting-edge knowledge creation. Engage with faculty and peers in person and take time away from home and office to focus on your learning and networking objectives. Join ‘Cambridge Union’-style debates, hear from guest speakers and faculty, interact with carefully selected peers and experience group exercises, role-play and vibrant discussion both in and outside class.
Who attends
This programme is for ambitious professionals looking to embed innovation, including:
- Executives leading innovation functions such as CTOs, R&D leaders, and VPs of engineering and technology.
- Department leaders responsible for driving innovation within their teams, from marketing to operations.
- Strategy leaders focused on shaping and delivering business model innovation.
- Managers stepping into, or preparing for, senior innovation leadership roles.

Faculty and speakers
Learn from our world-class faculty who bring fresh insights from their leading-edge research into all of our Executive Education programmes. The Academic Programme Director (APD) for the Managing Innovation Strategically programme is Professor Stelios Kavadias.
Stylianos (Stelios) Kavadias
Margaret Thatcher Professor of Enterprise Studies in Innovation and GrowthCo-Director of the Entrepreneurship Centre
PhD (INSEAD)
PhD (Georgia Institute of Technology)
Professorial Fellow of St Edmund’s College
PhD (University of Cambridge)
Why Cambridge Judge Business School?
Related programmes
Managing Innovation Strategically belongs to our Innovation & Technology-topic executive education programmes. Here is a selection of related programmes:
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Digital Innovation and Transformation
Re-think how you are leading the transformation of your organisation. Learn how to create digital solutions fit for your customers, build a digital culture, and develop a strategy to scale innovation across your business.
Leading Strategic Projects Successfully
Learn to embed projects within an organisational context, mastering complexity and uncertainty, managing stakeholders and leading and motivating your teams.
Speak to a programme advisor
If you have any questions or would like to discuss how this programme could benefit you or your organisation, please get in touch with the programme advisor.












