100% online MBA Public Sector Management
Credits:
180
180
Two years, part-time
£13,440
£13,440
100% online MBA in 24 months
World-class Russell Group member
Start within weeks
Pay-per-module
Total programme cost: £13,440
Ranked 18th in UK for Business and Management Studies (Complete University Guide 2025)
Next start: 10 March 2025
An MBA Public Sector Management for the future
Public sector organisations involve fast-paced change, and face pressure to deliver more with less, to navigate complex policy contexts, and to enhance performance while sustaining public service values. Designed for early- and mid-career professionals in the public or nonprofit sector, this online MBA Public Sector Management will prepare you for progression in your career.
This MBA is taught by international academics who are active in research and who bring new perspectives and global expertise. You’ll study part-time via distance learning, so you can apply your learning directly to your current role as you develop into a global citizen, able to influence organisations to see how they can help build more sustainable communities, fairer societies, and a cleaner environment. Through our innovative online learning environment, you will engage with fellow MBA students all over the world, growing your global network as you study.
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What you’ll learn on the MBA Public Sector Management:
- Management strategy
- Operations management
- Financial resources and risk within an organisation
- Contemporary issues in leadership
- Marketing in a global society
- Leading and managing change
- Policy analysis for a complex world
- Public-private partnerships in public services
- Ethical social leadership and public value
Advancing your career
This online MBA Public Sector Management has been designed to equip you with the ability to manage challenges often faced in the public and nonprofit sector, increasing your future career opportunities. Combining academic rigour with a practical focus, you will contrast the latest theoretical insights with real-world examples and your own professional experience, allowing you to become a more reflective and effective practitioner.
Your learning will draw on key themes relating to diversity, sustainability, and global citizenship. You will be developed into a socially responsible individual, as our academics endeavour to inspire you to make ongoing contributions to your communities as well as your employers.
Why York?
- Part of the elite Russell Group of major research-intensive universities
- Over 20,000 students and 4,000 staff from 150 countries
- Ranked joint 10th in the UK for research quality (Research Excellence Framework 2021)
- 17th overall in the Complete University Guide 2025
- University of the Year shortlisted (Times Higher Education Awards 2021)
- University of the Year shortlisted (The Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide 2022)
Entry requirements for home and international students
- 2:2 undergraduate degree or equivalent qualification. If you earned your degree outside the UK, our country-specific pages can help you check if it’s equivalent to a 2:2.
- Three years of managerial work experience
Or:
- Applicants with no or lower grade undergraduate degree may be considered if you have substantive professional experience
English language requirements
If English isn’t your first language you may need to provide evidence of your ability, we accept:
- International English Language Testing System (IELTS): 6.5, with a minimum of 6.5 in Writing and no less than 6.0 in all other components
- TOEFL IBT (internet-based and special home edition): 87, with a minimum of 23 in Writing and a minimum of 21 in all other components
- Trinity ISE: Level 3 with Merit in all components
- PTE Academic: 61, with a minimum of 61 in Writing and no less than 55 in all other components
- Cambridge Certificate in Advanced English (CAE) and Cambridge Proficiency (CPE): 176, with a minimum of 176 in Writing and no less than 169 in all other components
- GCSE: B / 6 or above
- Duolingo: 120, minimum 120 in production and 105 in all other components
- LanguageCert B2 Communicator: Pass with 33/50 in all other components
- LanguageCert Academic: 70 with a minimum of 70 in Writing and no less than 65 in all other components
- KITE: 459-494, with 459-494 in writing and 426-458 in all other components
- Skills for English: B2: Merit overall, with Merit in writing and Pass with Merit in all other components
- Oxford ELLT: 7 with a minimum of 7 in writing and 6 in all other components
Applicants who have completed a degree in English in the last seven years or who have completed work experience at an English-speaking organisation within the last two years may also be considered.
Modules
Strategy in Practice (15 credits)
This module explores management strategy and focuses on being a leader for the future. It provides an overview of strategic management theories and pays particular attention to ethical leadership and global citizenship and their impact on organisations.
Managing Business Operations (15 credits)
This module focuses upon operations management and how the interplay between strategy and operations is managed. It covers the activities of modern operations management and examines how business strategy affects business operations.
Managing Financial Resources and Risk (15 credits)
This module specially aims to give you an understanding of the financial resources and the financial risks within an organisation. It enables the interpretation of financial statements from business, facilitates investment and funding decisions perspectives, and explores a range of possible financial risks.
Contemporary Issues in Leadership (15 credits)
This module explores issues within leadership and management in organisations. It provides an in-depth view on developing a team drawing on management theories. Grounded in themes such as global citizenship, sustainability and celebrating diversity and difference, this module explores contemporary issues surrounding leadership and management within organisations.
Marketing and Society (15 credits)
This module examines marketing for businesses in a global society and explores the marketing challenges that all organisations face. It aims to study marketing for businesses in global settings and to develop the capacity to learn and engage with the opportunities and challenges of communicating brand images and corporate values across national, linguistic and cultural borders to a variety of consumers. It also considers a variety of methods, including new social media, as a mechanism of distributing knowledge and information.
Leading and Managing Change (15 credits)
The module recognises the complexity of change and the limitations of prescriptions for managing change, which are based on the use of various tools and techniques. At the same time, it seeks to develop an understanding of the role that tools and techniques can play in managing change, as well as in an individual’s capacity to influence change. It begins by introducing some established theories, frameworks and techniques for diagnosing, developing and evaluating approaches to managing change processes. The focus then shifts to a more practical application of these ideas. Throughout the module, there is a dual emphasis on both the organisation and the individual: how organisational contexts affect and shape change and the individual, and how the individual responds to change. There is also a strong link between theory and practice, drawing on case studies and examples from your own experiences.
Policy Analysis for Complex World (15 credits)
This module will explore and analyse the complexity inherent in contemporary social and public policy development and reform. It will critically examine the role of ideas, interests and institutions, and actors in the policy process and explore the wider social, economic and political processes that shape contemporary policy-making. It will equip you with the conceptual and analytical tools to enable you to undertake advanced applied policy analysis in a range of local, national and international policy settings.
Public-Private Partnerships in Public Services (15 credits)
This module introduces you to the distinction between the private sector and the public sector, and outlines the shifting relationship between these two sectors, from the bureaucratic paradigm of traditional public administration to the emergence of New Public Management and related public sector reform paradigms. It explores the development of public service markets both in theory and practice, including an analysis of performance management and outsourcing, and provides you with a critical understanding of the different facets of public-private partnerships in public service delivery today.
Ethical Social Leadership and Public Value (15 credits)
The module will familiarise you with the importance of ethical leadership and key ethical issues that might arise in relation to the operation of public administration and, more widely, of not-for-profit actors. It will also analyse the importance and possibilities of ethical leadership in sustaining the integrity of governance. Before moving towards a systematic empirical study of ethical leadership and integrity actors, you will be challenged to discuss and reflect upon your own value systems, particularly against the debate on universal ethical values and contextual choices that the everyday public official needs to make. The module will also prompt you to reflect upon the role of leadership in nonprofit organisations and their relationship with political authorities and the wider community.
Project Proposal (15 credits)
The purpose of the Project Proposal is to prepare you for your 30-credit Independent Study Project (ISP), to ensure that you equip yourself with and develop specific academic skills such as designing and structuring a feasible project, scoping the initial literature search, and identifying a solid theoretical foundation as well as a suitable case study. To achieve these objectives, the module will combine directed private studies in preparation of your project proposal, opportunities for tutor-guided peer review by fellow students, and feedback on progress with fine-tuning the ISP topic.
Independent Study Project (30 credits)
In your Independent Study Project, you will review and integrate learning from a range of modules studied on the programme, and apply these models, frameworks and theories encountered on the programme to analyse and evaluate an issue from your own professional contexts. The Independent Study Project ‘adds value’ beyond the taught modules as you can apply knowledge and skills from across different modules in a more holistic and in-depth way, focusing on a topic of your own choice and identifying an approach suitable for this topic. By actively using relevant models, frameworks, theories, research outputs and secondary data, you can analyse and draw conclusions about an issue that is essential to your work.