Accounting & Finance
The finance program at the School of Business Administration is structured to provide graduates the academic course work necessary to pursue certification as either a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA® ) or Certified Financial Manager (CFM). While significant overlap exists between the two designations, the CFA® focuses more extensively on security valuation and portfolio management, while the CFM emphasizes capital budgeting, current asset management, and cost analysis. The accounting program provides students with a thorough knowledge of conceptual and technical aspects of accounting, along with an understanding of corporate responsibility and accountability. Our financial and accounting faculty members have extensive field and research experience. They bring to the classroom a wealth of knowledge pertaining to accounting, finance and economics.
Previous graduates of our programs can be found in senior positions with major corporations both in the US and abroad. They have pursued careers in international and regional public accounting, corporate accounting, finance, and financial management.
Concentrations:
Marketing
Marketing is the business discipline that focuses on researching customer needs, and managing pricing, promotion, and distribution activities so as to reach a desired level of transactions with target markets. The marketing courses offered at the School of Business Administration combine analytical concepts as well as creative concepts that are important to competing in the global economy. Our highly qualified marketing faculty brings its extensive education, experience and research into the classroom to provide our students with the knowledge they need to be able to compete in a diverse, competitive, and environmentally-savvy corporate world.
Concentrations:
Information Systems and Decision Analysis
Management Information Systems/Decision Analysis is concerned with the use of information technology in building and using tools to effectively manage the production and distribution of goods and services. This includes the study of business programming, business process design, computer networking, customization, data & process modeling, database analysis & design, eCommerce, forecasting, manufacturing system design, operations management, quality and inventory control, risk analysis, supply chain management, and value chain management. Information technology can be applied to these operations in order to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of running a business.
Coursework in Management Information Systems/Decision Analysis is designed to prepare students for consulting and management careers by providing skills for the analysis, design, and implementation of business systems. While courses in Management Information Systems emphasize qualitative modeling techniques, Decision Analysis courses are typically more mathematical in nature.
The School of Business Administration Management Information Systems/Decision Analysis faculty members have done extensive research, are published in prestigious journals, and are highly skilled in these areas. In the classroom, they utilize the most advanced operational and informational methods available.
Concentrations:
Management and Strategy
The Management/Strategy group combines two continually evolving business disciplines. The management discipline is devoted to the study of how organizations manage interactions and changes, both internally and externally. This involves understanding the behavior of people and groups within organizations. The strategy discipline is devoted to the study of the set of policies that a firm adopts in order to create and sustain a competitive advantage. This involves understanding the behavior of a firm within its external market and non-market environments. Several of the important facets of these areas of study include: employee motivation, organizational development, the analysis of the political environment, the analysis of external market forces, the introduction and management of change processes, problem-solving and decision-making, and collective bargaining.
Our professors have done specialized research in such areas as aging in the workforce, economic analysis of firm interactions, employee-ownership, firm strategy in the political environment, human resources planning, industrial democracy, inter-organizational behavior, international labor management, labor markets, models of political behavior, organizational theory, and strategic planning in public sector organizations. Their research is incorporated into their classroom coursework, thus providing the students with a solid understanding of timely and relevant information regarding the management and strategy fields.
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