AI Agents and Systems

1.5 Credits · Level: Graduate

Artificial intelligence has moved from the periphery of the enterprise to its operating core. Across financial services, retail, healthcare, government, manufacturing, and technology, AI is reshaping competitive moats, organizational design, customer experience, and the daily work of decision-making. Worldwide spending on AI is projected to reach $2.5 trillion in 2026, and nearly nine in ten organizations now use AI in at least one business function. The technology is no longer experimental; it is becoming infrastructure. For MBAs, this represents one of the most significant strategic opportunities of their careers. Those who learn to design, deploy, and lead AI inside real organizations will shape the next decade of enterprise transformation. Those who do not will find their roles redefined around them. The question is no longer whether to engage with AI, but how to lead the transition with judgment, rigor, and a clear sense of where value is created. This course provides a strategic and applied exploration of AI for business leaders. It moves beyond foundational concepts to focus on how AI systems are designed, deployed, governed, and scaled inside real organizations. Students will examine the modern AI stack, including agents, the Model Context Protocol (MCP), custom workflows, evaluation, observability, and responsible AI toolkits, and will leave the course with a portfolio of working artifacts they can apply directly in their roles. At the heart of the course is a portable framework for deploying AI solutions into production that holds across industries. The skills, decisions, and architecture patterns are the same; only the use case changes. Students will practice this framework on real business problems, build functioning prototypes, and defend their work in front of faculty and practitioners. Taught with input from industry practitioners and operators, the course is designed for MBAs across functions including strategy, finance, marketing, operations, entrepreneurship, and consulting. No prior coding experience is required.