Graduate Certificate in Competitive Intelligence

This course provides the student with a firm foundation in qualitative analysis and modeling techniques, including rational choice, utility, and game theories, in order to create and test hypotheses. Students will apply basic trend analysis techniques and forecasting methods such as probability tree analysis, analytic hierarchy process, alternative scenarios/futures, Delphi technique, and the Lockwood Analytical Method for Prediction (LAMP).

This course will aid the student in writing clear and concise intelligence related documentation. Through a series of practical intelligence related exercises, the student will learn to choose the appropriate writing style required to properly and effectively communicate their message to their simulated target audience, including proper formatting and citation styles, as well as the best use of tables, diagrams, graphics and charts.

Students in this course evaluate the growing field of competitive intelligence also known outside the U.S. as business intelligence. Topics will include how to turn information into intelligence, and how that intelligence can be used to gain a competitive edge in the market place. Particular emphasis will be placed on the use of open source intelligence, as well as the use of competitive intelligence to analyze a business’s vulnerability to information operations that its competitors may use against it. Additional topics include state-sponsored economic intelligence gathering and covert and deceptive activities. Military students should not confuse the civilian business term of "competitive intelligence" with the military term of "competitive intelligence" which means a competing, independent analysis of the same source material.

This course examines the area of business law and applies it to the business environment. Traditional topics covered include: the legal environment of business, contract law, property, sales contracts, commercial paper, agency law, ethics and the regulatory environment. The course also examines the issue of the global economy from the view that the largest companies dominate in the creation of jobs and technological innovation.

This course is a study of the major corporate finance and financial management theory, strategy, processes, functions, and other issues. Topics include the finance function, concepts of sources and uses of funds, analysis and estimation of need for funds (short- and long-term), short-term sources, working capital management policy, long-term sources, capital structure policy and implementation, capital budgeting and the cost of capital.

This course provides the student with an introduction to the methods and techniques of criminal intelligence analysis and strategic organized crime. The rapid increase in multinational analysis and transnational organized crime, corporate drug trafficking organizations, and the impact of crime on national and international policy has created a critical need for law enforcement intelligence experts in the relatively new field of criminal intelligence. The course shows how to use criminal intelligence analysis to predict trends, weaknesses, capabilities, intentions, changes, and warnings needed to dismantle criminal organizations. This course provides knowledge needed by law enforcement professionals at the federal, state, and local level, by criminal intelligence analysts working in private industry, and by military intelligence personnel making a transition from a military to a law enforcement career. The course provides a background of the use of intelligence to dismantle criminal organizations and businesses. This course emphasizes criminal/law enforcement intelligence, as opposed to criminal investigation.

Students in this course will study personality profile fundamentals of foreign military and political leaders. They will study personality assessment from a psychoanalytic viewpoint, observe questions asked by intelligence agencies, study several various military and political leaders in depth.

This course will examine cybercrime and the legal, social and technical issues cybercrime presents. With a multi-disciplinary perspective, we will focus on ways information technology is used to commit crimes, investigative techniques used to discover the crimes, and the challenges involved in prosecuting cybercrimes These challenges include jurisdictional issues, application of traditional laws to cybercrimes, and privacy issues encountered during prevention, investigation and prosecution.

This course provides a framework for understanding and protecting against industrial espionage. It reviews the history of industrial espionage, current methods of information elicitation, and explores counterespionage options to defend organizations. Students will also learn how companies place their proprietary and protected information at risk as well as how to prevent unwanted information disclosure. Topics such as the Economic Espionage Act of 1996 and operational counterintelligence are covered. The purpose of the course is to teach how to recognize and neutralize serious threats to both business and government entities.