Chicago Booth MBA - Curriculum (Analysis)

At Chicago Booth, the MBA curriculum is designed to build leaders who think with clarity and act with impact. 

Booth’s hallmark is its flexibility: there’s no lockstep “Year 1” or “Year 2” model. Instead, students design their path based on prior knowledge, future goals, and the confidence to make decisions that shape their journey from the first quarter onward.

While the curriculum is expansive, three themes run through the Booth MBA:
•    A strong foundation in analytical thinking
•    Intentional leadership development
•    Unparalleled flexibility in building expertise across disciplines

In this Chicago Booth MBA Curriculum Analysis, we cover:
•    Year 1: Building Analytical Leaders
•    Foundational Disciplines
•    The Functions, Leadership, and Business Environment Framework
•    Year 2: Deepening Focus and Customization
•    Electives
•    Experiential Learning & Global Exposure
•    Dual Degree in International Relations
•    Industry Treks
•    Research & Centers 
•    Joint Degrees and Certificates
•    Student-Led Clubs
 

Year 1: Building Analytical Leaders

Booth’s first-year experience is structured to equip students with the ability to approach problems analytically, navigate uncertainty, and lead decisively. The curriculum encourages students to combine structure with autonomy. While everyone starts with key foundational work, Booth doesn’t believe in a fixed curriculum. Students can skip introductory classes if they qualify and jump into advanced electives early.

LEAD: Leadership Effectiveness and Development

Booth’s only mandatory course is LEAD, an immersive leadership development program that starts before classes even begin. 
LEAD combines behavioral science, feedback, and real-time team simulations. 

Students learn how to show up in teams, how others perceive them, and what leadership means in action.

Foundational Disciplines: The Analytical Bedrock

At the heart of Booth’s philosophy is the belief that great business decisions begin with strong analytical foundations. 

Three core disciplines form this base: Financial Accounting, Microeconomics, and Statistics. 

Booth allows students to tailor their learning within each discipline. 

Those new to the subject can start with basic courses, while experienced students can opt for accelerated or advanced alternatives.

Accounting

Accounting at Booth is about understanding business health. 

Students explore how to read and interpret financial statements, assess performance, and derive strategic insights. 

Advanced learners can dig deeper into deal structuring, complex regulatory scenarios, and valuation techniques critical for careers in investment banking or corporate finance.

Microeconomics

Booth’s finance heritage shines in its microeconomics offerings. 

The courses introduce students to key market dynamics, pricing, and firm behavior, tools that are indispensable while evaluating industry competition in consulting or building marketplace models in technology. 

Advanced classes cover price theory and game theory, providing a toolkit for navigating strategic complexity.

Statistics

Statistics is the silent engine behind Booth’s data-driven culture. 

Booth teaches students to derive actionable insights by crunching numbers. 

The basics include regression, probability, and hypothesis testing, while advanced options branch into financial econometrics, big data, and machine learning.

The Functions, Leadership, and Business Environment Framework

As students move beyond foundational disciplines at Booth, they encounter the heart of the MBA: a flexible yet comprehensive framework that allows them to build expertise across critical business areas. 

Booth’s broader curriculum is organized across three major domains:

•    Business Functions – the operational and financial engines of an enterprise: strategy, marketing, operations, and finance.
•    Leadership & Management – the human dimension of business: decision-making, power, influence, and organizational behavior.
•    Business Environment – the macro lens: understanding how governments, societies, and global systems shape markets and regulation.

Case Study (PE)

A student concentrating in private equity might take finance electives from the Business Functions track, decision science from Leadership & Management, and global macroeconomics from Business Environment to understand international deal dynamics. 

Case Study (Product Manager) 

A future product manager might mix pricing strategy and data science with organizational behavior and ESG regulation. This interplay is what gives Booth’s academic experience both rigor and personal relevance.

Students are required to complete courses from seven out of eight categories drawn from Business Functions, Leadership & Management, and Business Environment, but how they approach that requirement is entirely up to them. Some use it to strengthen technical skills, others to broaden perspectives, and many to lay the groundwork for one or more formal concentrations.

Business Functions

At Booth, the Business Functions track offers a comprehensive menu of courses in Finance, Marketing, Operations, and Strategy. Students can begin with fundamental concepts before diving into advanced electives that cater to specific industries and functions.

Leadership & Management

Booth firmly believes that analytical skill alone does not make a leader. 

The Leadership & Management track focuses on the human side of business, equipping students with tools to make sound decisions under uncertainty and to inspire and influence others.

Business Environment

Booth insists that business decisions are inseparable from the broader environment in which firms operate. 

The Business Environment track helps students grasp how macroeconomic trends, regulatory changes, and societal forces shape markets and opportunities.

Year 2: Deepening Focus and Customization

In the second year, Booth students shift from building a foundation to specializing in areas aligned with their career goals. By this point, most core requirements have been completed, and students now focus on electives, labs, and advanced courses to gain depth. 

Many second-years also participate in leadership positions across clubs, competitions like the New Venture Challenge, or experiential programs such as the PE/VC Lab or International Business Exchange. 

Number of Electives and Flexibility

To make Year 2 flexible, students take between 10–12 electives, many of which offer hands-on learning and cross-disciplinary integration.

Electives: Choice with Intent

Booth offers over 100 electives each year across areas like finance, strategy, entrepreneurship, leadership, and international business. 

Most students build a plan aligned with their target industry or functional interest. 

For example:
•    A student targeting private equity might choose courses like "Cases in Financial Management," "Entrepreneurial Finance and Private Equity," and "Commercializing Innovation."

•    Someone interested in product management might explore "Developing New Products and Services," "Platform Competition," and "Algorithmic Marketing."

Electives also include access to lab-based courses, such as:
•    PE/VC Lab
•    New Venture Challenge
•    Marketing Lab
•    Impact Investing Lab

These labs offer real-world exposure by partnering with firms and solving actual business problems under faculty supervision. 
Electives can be taken across three quarters (Autumn, Winter, Spring), and students often use Spring of their second year to audit or explore interdisciplinary electives.

Concentrations: Optional but Strategic

No Formal Majors

Booth does not require formal majors, but students may pursue up to three concentrations to reflect their area of focus. 

Up to 3 Concentrations

Each concentration consists of a few related courses, and students typically qualify for one or two naturally through their elective choices. There are 13 official concentrations, grouped under Booth’s academic framework. 

Students pursuing Entrepreneurship, for example, might complete courses in venture strategy, new venture challenge, and entrepreneurial finance. 

A student focused on Behavioral Science may pair negotiation and decision-making with behavioral economics.

Experiential Learning & Global Exposure: Learning by Doing, Thinking Globally

Global Learning: Exposure to Operating Global

Booth MBA’s global learning is organized around immersions –short-term and full-term exchanges with diverse functional exposure from supply chain management, policy, and cultural adaptations.

The International Business Exchange Program (IBEP) offers an opportunity to spend a full academic quarter at a top institution abroad, from HEC Paris to IIM Bangalore. This isn’t just a cultural experience; it’s a full academic and professional immersion into how business is taught, practiced, and understood in a different system.

Random Walks: In 10 days, Booth’s iconic pre-MBA international trips help classmates become collaborators and forge friendships that set the tone for a globally curious MBA community.

Short Term Programs

For those who can’t dedicate a full quarter, Booth’s short-term global study programs provide concentrated exposure, like understanding sustainability practices in Sweden or digital disruption in China.
 

Global Labs: Business Meets Context

Booth’s lab courses take applied learning a step further by placing students directly into international challenges. 

•    In the Global Social Impact Practicum (GSIP), students have explored sustainable fuel solutions in rural India and conducted fieldwork in Southeast Asia to analyze consumer behavior in emerging economies.

•    These labs combine research, analytics, and local collaboration, building business acumen, cultural empathy and stakeholder management skills.

Industry Treks: Behind the Scenes of Global Business

Booth’s Industry Treks are compact but powerful, weeklong visits to global business hubs that unlock insider access to companies, from private equity firms in Hong Kong to fintech startups in Tel Aviv. These treks dive deep into how industries operate locally, what drives hiring trends, and where growth is happening. These treks also help students align their career ambitions with the realities of regional markets.

Dual Degree in International Relations: Where Markets and Power Meet

For students at the intersection of commerce and global policy, Booth offers a dual MBA/MA in International Relations. This interdisciplinary path weaves together economics, diplomacy, and political systems. It’s for those who want to understand how central banks shape markets, how global conflict affects supply chains, or how climate policy alters investment strategy. 

Graduates emerge equipped for roles that demand business fluency, geopolitical sensitivity, consulting in fragile markets, leading cross-border strategy, or working in public-private partnerships.

Student-Led Global Communities

Booth’s global reach extends into its student community, where regionally focused clubs become spaces for thought leadership and dialogue. 

Groups like the Booth India Club or Middle East and North Africa Group  organize cultural nights, host policy panels, lead career treks, and invite CEOs and thought leaders to speak on topics like sovereign wealth, startup regulation, or post-colonial economic strategy.

These platforms provide informal and powerful arenas for developing cross-cultural literacy and global business fluency, often as valuable as coursework itself.

Joint Degrees and Certificates: Expanding the MBA’s Intellectual Borders

Booth’s commitment to interdisciplinary learning is most evident in its suite of joint-degree and certificate programs. These pathways let students shape the MBA around career intersections, healthcare, tech, public policy, international relations, and more.

•    A student interested in AI product management might pursue the MBA/MS in Applied Data Science.
•    Someone eyeing healthcare leadership can tailor their path through the Graduate Program in Health Administration and Policy (GPHAP).
•    The JD/MBA, MBA/MPP, or MBA/MD tracks support students ready to navigate the overlap between business, governance, and regulation.

Research & Centers: Where Ideas Take Root and Scale

Booth’s experiential learning ecosystem is powered by centers where students collaborate with faculty and industry to generate, test, and implement ideas.

•    The Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation is a launchpad for ventures, guiding Boothies from ideation to funding through programs like the New Venture Challenge.

•    The Rustandy Center links Booth’s analytical rigor with social purpose, enabling students to work on impact investing, nonprofit strategy, and ESG initiatives.

•    In finance and economics, centers like CRSP and the Fama-Miller Center provide data and tools that shape both scholarship and student projects.

Research and Teaching Centers

These centers allow students to conduct research that often leads to publications, policy recommendations, or investor-backed ventures, creating direct links between education and action.

Student-Led Clubs: Labs for Leadership

Booth’s over 80 student clubs offer hands-on leadership and professional immersion, from finance and consulting to music and wine tasting.

•    Professional Groups: The Management Consulting Group, Private Equity Group, and Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital Group lead resume workshops, mock interviews, and trek logistics, real leadership, not just resume lines.

•    Cultural and affinity groups like OUTreach, Greater China Club, and Chicago Women in Business create inclusive spaces for exploring identity, opportunity, and professional development in global markets.

•    Social Groups: Even social groups like the Epicurean Club or AudioBooth often double as networking opportunities, reminding students that the most valuable insights sometimes happen over a shared meal or music sessions.

Here is the list of the Booth Student clubs:

1.    African American MBA Association
2.    Armed Forces Group
3.    AudioBooth
4.    Belgian Club
5.    Booth Analytics Club
6.    Booth Coffee Club
7.    Booth Cricket Club
8.    Booth Dance Club
9.    Booth Education Group (BoothED)
10.    Booth Hacks
11.    Booth Outdoor Leadership Development Group
12.    Booth Partners
13.    Booth Technology Group (BoothTech)
14.    Business Solutions Group
15.    Canadian Business Group
16.    Chicago Africa Business Group
17.    Chicago Asia Pacific Group
18.    Chicago Booth Basketball Club
19.    Chicago Booth Boxing Club
20.    Chicago Booth FinTech
21.    Chicago Booth Follies
22.    Chicago Booth Golf Club
23.    Chicago Booth Rugby Club
24.    Chicago Booth Ski & Snowboard
25.    Chicago Booth Soccer Club
26.    Chicago Booth Squash and Tennis Club
27.    Chicago Booth Strategy Games Club
28.    Chicago Booth Triathlon and Running Club
29.    Chicago Booth Volleyball Club
30.    Chicago Business (ChiBus)
31.    Chicago Women in Business
32.    Chicagonomics
33.    Christians in Business
34.    Corporate Finance Group
35.    Corporate Management Group
36.    Credit Restructuring Distressed Investing and Turnaround Group (CREDIT)
37.    Dean’s Marketing Advisory Committee (DMAC)
38.    Dean’s Student Admissions Committee (DSAC)
39.    Dean's Student & Alumni Representatives (DStAR)
40.    Economies of Scale Acapella
41.    Emerging Markets Summit Group
42.    Energy Group
43.    Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital (EVC)
44.    Entrepreneurship Through Acquisition (ETA) Group
45.    Epicurean Club
46.    European Business Group
47.    FEAD (Food, Environment, Agribusiness, and Development) Group
48.    Giving Something Back
49.    Government and Policy Club
50.    Greater China Club
51.    Graduate Business Council (GBC)
52.    Healthcare Group
53.    Hedge Fund Group
54.    Hispanic American Business Students Association
55.    Human Capital Club
56.    Innovation and Design Club
57.    Investment Banking Group
58.    Investment Management Group
59.    Japan Club
60.    JD/MBA Association
61.    Jewish Business Students Association (JSBA)
62.    Korean Business Group
63.    Latin American Business Group
64.    Latter-Day Saints Student Association
65.    Management Consulting Group (MCG)
66.    Marketing Group
67.    Media, Entertainment and Sports Group
68.    Middle East and North Africa Group
69.    Mothers at Booth
70.    Muslims In Business
71.    Net Impact
72.    Chicago Booth Operations Strategy Group
73.    OUTreach
74.    PhotoBooth
75.    Private and Family Business Group
76.    Private Equity Group
77.    Public Speaking and Communications Group
78.    Real Estate Group
79.    Retail, Apparel, and Luxury Group
80.    Risk/Gaming Club
81.    Search Fund Group
82.    South Asian Business Group (SABG)
83.    The Adam Smith Society
84.    Wine Club
85.    Yoga Club

Reference

• Chicago Booth MBA