Words From

There is much pleasure in supervising Live Projects. As “Live” means real life, business concepts come to life, students are excited about it, and I share their excitement.

In Live Project, everybody contributes and gets benefits in return. For students, they contribute by helping their host organization solve business problems. In return, they gain eye-opening experience, pick up good practices, apply theories and concepts to real-life situations, develop problem-solving skills and learn how to interact with practitioners. For host organizations, they provide real-life scenarios to students and share business knowledge and different perspectives. In return, business problems get solved fully or at least partially. For university management, it facilitates student learning, transfers knowledge to the community and builds up links with the community. As for project supervisors, we groom the next generation and serve the community. In return, this fosters teaching and learning outcomes.

Indeed, with constructive interactions among students, host organizations and the university, there are knowledge sharing, cross-fertilization of ideas, generation of insights and mutual support. Seeing this win-win situation, I have a sense of achievement and satisfaction.

Of course, there’re always challenges, e.g. how to manage differences in requirements / needs / expectations of different parties and how to equip students with the requisite knowledge and skills. As a project supervisor, I play the roles of business consultant/manager/facilitator/mediator. This calls for sound knowledge and rich experience in business management, global perspective and communication skills.

Well, it is a great pleasure to supervise Live Project, because it is ‘Live’ and it benefits all parties concerned. As for the challenges, I am sure these can be overcome with determination and continuous improvement.

Dr Ken Chow
Live Project Supervisor

Ms Noopy Ha
Live Project Supervisor

"The British Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong set a project for two syndicates from the course to examine how it should create a 'job search' capability to serve its SME members on its web site. The project lasted from October 2010 to April 2011. One syndicate was female and one all male. The project commenced with a briefing which set out the objectives of the project and set the timeline for completion. Support from the Chamber was through its Marketing and Communications Executive on an as required basis and with two timed meetings to monitor progress.  The entire project was conducted in English, both oral and written.  The final part was a presentation to the Executive Director of the Chamber and his Marketing and Communications Executive in two parts; one 40 minute presentation and question and answer. Both syndicates produced solutions of high quality and the male syndicate in addition to the master project solution gave a completely new approach to dealing with the problem by the use of social media.  Both syndicates in addition to the formal oral presentation produced excellent written submissions. The Chamber was delighted with the quality of the work and the positive attitude of the students who made up the two syndicates. It underlined the value of the associate Degree when combined with a high quality 'Top Up' such as that offered by Edinburgh Napier University."

Brigadier Christopher Hammerbeck CB.CBE.
Executive Director

"I was honoured to  work with students from Edinburgh Napier University's BA Hons Marketing Management course in Hong Kong on  a live project, which involves students working on a real life marketing issue  and coming up with solutions.   I'm originally from Edinburgh so I know Edinburgh Napier University well - the University's standards and  qualifications are  really good quality, which is  one of the reasons I agreed to get involved.   I am very glad that  I did.   I was so impressed with the  students ideas and professionalism during  the project that I  hired two of the University's students as interns with the aim to hire at least one of them  full time in the future."

Mandy Queen,
Founder and Managing Director of CRED Communications Ltd.

"SPCA worked with 4 teams of students on 2 projects: “Branding” and “Face-to-Face Fundraising”. During this interaction we are pleased that students showed a fair amount of interest and positive attitude towards the project. The projects are real business problems that our organization is facing. By exposing the students to these real-life problems we hope that they will have an appreciation of what is required in the business world, and possibly offer a “bolt of lightning” solution.

The result is mixed. While some students try hard and go the extra mile, others are still seeing it as simply another university project and thus preclude making effort to really understand the issues deeper and offer practical solutions. The onus is upon all three parties (university, business partner, and students) to ensure that students can get the most out of it. A variation of this scheme, by deeper immersion of the students into the organization, may prove to be more worthwhile in terms of kick-starting their thought process. In summary, it was an interesting and worthwhile exercise for SPCA as a host organization and we are happy to support the program."

Michael Wong, Director of Community Development
Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA)

I am glad that I decided to study Edinburgh Napier University programme although I gave up the chance of studying for a local degree. I have learnt a lot from BA (Hons) Marketing Management, which aims at both theory and practice.

The BAMM assignments emphasize theoretical application which helps to enhance students’ critical thinking. The module I appreciate most is ‘Live Project’. It strengthens students’ skills of tackling challenges in real life situations. It also enables us to cooperate with the existing companies for the sake of specific problem solving. Last but not least, the graduation dissertation would be a big challenge for students but you will find the dissertation supervisors are patient and helpful. Undoubtedly, it helps to equip students with different techniques like research methodology and offers students an opportunity of analyzing their interested social issues.

The Edinburgh Napier University programme has offered me full of freedom and excitement. I am grateful that I met a group of classmates of BAMM who are really nice and friendly. We all enjoyed the cheerful moment together.

I was surprised by being awarded the Director’s List by SCOPE which is definitely great encouragement for my studies.

TAM Hiu Ming Tammi, Graduate 2012
Awardee of The Director's List 2012

If I had a chance to choose the options between studying 2 modules or doing a Live Project, I would choose the latter again. The experience of doing the Project let me know the difference between academic theories and real life marketing situation and thus has changed my mind about insurance industry.

What is a Live Project? It is a module that provides a chance for students to work for any marketing activities in the real market. Students are playing the role of marketing consultant who is responsible for generating a marketing plan, strategy, and so on.

My Host Organization is a famous insurance company in the world. The nature of my Project is focusing on B2B relationships. Our group wants to understand the needs of brokers and develop a useful servicing model to attract and assist brokers. The servicing model will be suggested after the step of analysis. The realistic and cost-effective suggestion will be provided in the end of the report.

There were a number of difficulties when our group were doing this Project. First, our group are students only. How can we get the connection with brokers? Second, how can we collect the accurate information from broker firms and their competitors? It may involve some business secrets. Furthermore, after we get the information related to brokers, how can we know whether such information is significant to our Project? Thanks to our tutor and organization coordinator. With their help, we could finish this meaningful Project.

Generally speaking, Hong Kong people have negative impression to insurance industry. They feel annoyed when agency is selling a product to them. They are worried that agency will invest with their money and finally lose it in the investment. After I understood the industry environment and communicated with the host organization, I changed my mind. They are very professional in financial management and concerned about their customer needs.

After completing this Project, I have received an internship invitation from my interviewee. It is out of my expectation!

In the end, I would like to thank City University of Hong Kong as they design this meaningful Project for us. It is not easy to discover a similar Project/module in Hong Kong and I have learnt a lot including good time management, relationships and communication skills that are essential to a person who wants to succeed in a competitive environment. I hope this Project will be launched successfully again next year! Thanks so much again!

Ng Ka Yi Cara, Graduate 2012
Awardee of the Director's List 2012

This is Cherie, I would like to share my experience in studying Live Project. In the Project, we need to support Lifelong College in designing a marketing plan on how to establish an IELTS course as well as to attract more people to join its distance-learning courses. It is an excellent experience in obtaining a real world experience. In the Live Project, I polish my skills in team-working, time management and communication. This experience is very different from doing a school assignment, as we need to cooperate with a company manager, understand the company needs and concerns before making any decision on the marketing plan.

The Live Project can help me to understand more about myself and my future goal. After studying the Live Project, I have decided to pursue my life goal as a business woman with my own business. Since Marketing is a challenging discipline and this pressure will keep motivating me to move on and improve continuously. I think it is important for a fresh graduate to enhance himself/herself every moment as to increase his/her competitiveness in the working society. Finally, I would like to say studying Live Project will make you different.

Cherie Lee Ka Yi, Graduate 2012

"Studying Business (Hons) Marketing Management in Edinburgh Napier University was one of my wisest choices in my study path. I still remember how I felt when I first applied this programme; the capability to study in this program was my major concern as a student who did not had much experience in studying marketing before. The guidance and patience from Napier University and SCOPE, City University of Hong Kong lecturers and tutors has been offered the greatest support to my studies. I believe things which I have learnt and experienced from this program such as presentation skills and marketing related knowledge did not only gain me better grades, but will also be useful in my career life in the nearly future.

My favourite module of this program is the Live Project, it is a group-based project offered by organizations with specific objectives in relation to marketing issues. It was a remarkable experience; it allowed me and my group-mates to understand what it is like to work as a marketer in a business world.  I am honoured and pleased that I am currently working for an organization was one of the Live Project organizations which some of Napier students worked on in Live Project."

Alisdair Jeremy Chun Kit Chan, Graduate 2011

"Time flies, I still remember the moment when I first applied for this programme. At the beginning of this programme, I was filled with nervousness and anxiety as an Associate Degree graduate with an accounting background who had never studied any Marketing modules before. Fortunately, with the guidance of the tutors, I have discovered this programme is practical and comprehensive in my future career pursuit.

Firstly, the marketing field is ever changing and I can become more creative and work well in a team I never met. Live Project definitely expands my mindset to think differently and requires me to explore from all aspects in a tight timeline. The sweet memory of doing real-live research is still fresh and interesting. As the Live Project involves us to work for a company which is a leading medical dictionary publisher for hospitals and doctors, the primary data collected from doctors is significant for critical analysis; therefore, apart from doing questionnaires, I was strongly encouraged by my Live Project Supervisor to visit doctors in hospitals and clinics to do face-to-face interviews so as to get in-depth information. I did it (with initial hesitation as a rather shyly girl) by considering most doctors work in clinics and hospitals may reject the interviews in working hours. This is a treasurable experience for me to think in different angles and have a touch of what it is like working in this field as a marketer. 

Secondly, there are many down-to-earth training I learnt which is relevant to real-life marketing. One of the applicable practices is the Oral Presentation. Before I start studying this programme, I always felt stressful to present in front of people. Now, I do believe in the maxim “practice makes perfect” and feel so confident to make any presentations, like in the Live Project sharing in October of this year. In practice, fluent communication is necessary when it comes to the sales and marketing field in order to promote products and services to customers.

Lastly, the integral part of this programme is to boost my critical thinking skills and always brainstorm my mindset through academic assessments in this couple of years. I understand learning is not only bound in the numerous books, but also need to generate ideas and ways for handling real situations. Doing the dissertation is really an unforgettable experience, both for the learning process and broadening of horizons. I understand making communication in writing is significant as it is what I will be handling with in my future career path."

Nattie CHENG Tsz-Ting, Graduate 2011

"Marketing requires very innovative and creative individuals, and this programme encourages and develops students to do exactly this. The overseas and local professors and tutors are very supportive and encourages independent learning.

The Live Project module is a particularly important aspect of this programme, as it allowed students an opportunity to conduct a real-time marketing project for a real-life corporation. Through the process of communications and critical thinking, this module allowed me to become more confident for finding a career after graduation. I think whether you are able to effectively learn something greatly depends on if you are able to apply it in the real world. The Live Project module of this programme was exactly what I need that allowed me to do this. This module pressed me to think out of the box, and out of conventional textbook rules of study, and allowed me to be more flexible and think differently in the according field. The Live Project is in its first year of facilitation when I did this module, and it seemed to present a huge challenge, as there were no previous benchmarks of what was expected. However, upon taking this risk, I found that I gained even more in return, as my lecturer Mr Eric Lau would say: "never go, never know!"

Shadow LING Wun-Ying, Graduate 2011

"Studying in BAMMBS is the most memorable experience throughout my school life. The Lecturers are professional and helpful. They are eager to understand students’ needs.

Apart from caring lecturers, the contents of the course are useful in meeting the needs of the current business environment. We learn about practical knowledge of business field and how to evaluate a situation critically. Students are trained to provide solutions based on statistical analysis and knowledge we acquire from other modules. The practical content, of course, greatly enhances my confidence in facing potential challenges in my future careers.

Times files with a year’s happy learning. I am pleased to be a student of Edinburgh Napier University. I feel really grateful for all the kind support from the lecturers. Thank you very much!"

Lodis Li, BAMMBS Graduate 2009

"It is my honor to share my feeling about our graduation and I am so proud to graduate from BA (Hons) in Marketing Management with Business Studies. During the study, I have enriched my knowledge of marketing management and broadened my horizons of international environment.

I feel so lucky to have met all of my teachers. I would like to take this opportunity to thank them since they have helped me overcome many difficulties and brought out the best in me.

My dear classmates, although we will go different ways from tomorrow onwards, I will never forget our school life includes happiness, effort and the bitter. I hope every one of you have a brilliant future.

Finally, thank you once again my dear teachers and classmates. All of my memory with you is one of the highlights in my life."

Chan Kwok Ho, Edward, BAMMBS Graduate 2009