Ruud felt that the links between academic knowledge and practical application were much stronger at TIAS’s Master in Finance than in his previous experience of other Masters. “I really appreciated that. Every course consists of two or three days of lessons, with half of the time spent on academic content and the other half with insights on ways to apply that knowledge in practice. The guest speakers played an important role in this as well. They would explain how certain accounting rules applied to acquisitions based on examples from practice, for instance. Even for subjects that were less relevant to me personally, those guest lectures offered a nice glimpse into the ways in which academic knowledge may be applied in practice.

Challenging practical assignments “The practical group assignments we were expected to work on after lectures were quite challenging. They weren’t just practice-oriented, they also encouraged a critical approach and taught you to review and apply what you’d just learned. You really had to put in the effort, particularly for the modules’ final assignments. This approach requires you to take a critical look at the material, rather than simply regurgitating knowledge during exams. You have to actually apply that knowledge. For example, first you were taught the theory of business valuation, and then your final assignment would be to spend two weeks creating a valuation for an international company. That definitely helped make the knowledge stick. Thanks to this learning approach, I gained a lot of practical skills.”

Learning with and from each other through interaction and discussion “During the Master in Finance I got to work with a great many people from all kinds of organizations outside the consulting world. There is a lot of interaction and discussion in the program. That was incredibly enriching. Consulting does create its own perspective. We tend to approach problems differently than a corporation or government organization would.”