HSE GSB and Avito Program Wins “Breakthrough of the Year”

HSE Graduate School of Business, in partnership with Avito — Russia’s largest online marketplace for buying and selling goods and services — has been awarded the School of Education Award “Breakthrough of the Year” for its Master’s in Product Management in IT Business.

The SEA annually recognizes projects and professionals who shape the modern educational landscape and advance new approaches to designing learning experiences. The award is given to initiatives that redefine standards of educational quality and promote human-centered learning practices.

The Master’s program “Product Management in IT Business” was developed by Avito experts in collaboration with faculty from the HSE Graduate School of Business. Its structure is based on Avito’s product manager competency framework and covers the full range of digital product management from analytics and user research to business model development and data-driven decision-making.

Mikhail M. Komarov

Programme Academic Supervisor, Professor of the Department of Business Informatics, HSE Graduate School of Business

We build on the product competency framework used within the company and enrich it with the expertise of our faculty. This approach allows us to train mid-level product managers who understand both the business logic of digital services and the technological aspects of their development. This mix of expertise is highly valued by Russia’s leading IT companies today.

There is a strong emphasis on hands-on training. Students work with real-world cases and develop their own product solutions. In addition, they can apply for a product management internship—a six-month program embedded within one of Avito’s product teams. Throughout the internship, participants are supported by an experienced mentor and a community of fellow interns.

At Avito, representatives emphasize that collaboration with universities is a key part of their strategy for developing product culture and training new talent for the tech industry.

“Product culture at Avito starts with a deep understanding of user needs. We combine this principle with data analytics and rapid hypothesis testing. Partnering with universities is an important part of our strategy and our joint Master’s program with the HSE Graduate School of Business allows us to share this expertise and help students start building their careers while still in school,” said Ilya Gruber, Cluster Product Leader at Avito Logistics.