Course Descriptions - Business/Marketing/Retailing

This course is designed to provide a broad overview of the functions of the for-profit and non-profit business entity. Business and its environment, organization and management, ownership, finance, production, marketing, human resources, and control systems are reviewed. The course helps students understand the contribution of business to the American economy using current business publications, media, and web resources to focus on applications of current business technologies. Business ethics and teamwork are also examined. This course will enable the student to more intelligently pursue advanced business courses and to choose a business career.

This course focuses on the skills necessary to be successful and effective in the workplace. In addition to effectively contributing to a team while working with a diverse population, topics include: understanding human behavior, personal qualities of success, emotional intelligence, communication, workplace etiquette, conflict resolution, self-esteem, and goal setting.

This course focuses on the skills necessary to be successful when supervising and collaborating with others. Students will apply and develop skills in management functions, decision making, time management, communications, conflict resolution, leadership, quality improvement, motivation and personnel development.BUS 1100 or BUS 1110 or business background recommended

This course provides students with an understanding of the nature of leadership and teams. This course is for anyone who is a leader or wants to be a leader and wants to develop teamwork skills. Emphasis will be on a practical skill-building approach to leadership and teamwork so students develop skills that can be applied outside of the classroom. This course will include the nature and importance of leadership, characteristics of leaders, leadership styles, developing teams, managing virtual teams, ethics and social responsibility, communication, conflict resolution, and culturally diverse aspects of leadership.

Students will study the basic principles of law and the societal forces which influence the development of these principles. Topics include legal procedure, court structure, ethics, international law, constitutional law, administrative law, contracts, sales, torts, business entities, business regulation, and consumer protection. The focus of the course is on business entities, their employees and customers.

This course provides the students with essential mathematical concepts and practical business applications of pricing, discounts, commission, simple and compound interest, installment buying, consumer credit, depreciation, taxes, simple business statistics, and other business finance situations. Problem-solving skills are developed. Computational math skills are needed.

This course is an introduction to the world of finance. Concepts covered include financial management, financial implications of different forms of business organization, understanding and analyzing financial statements and various ratios. Additional topics studied include security markets, interest rates, taxes, risk analysis, time value of money, and the basics of bonds and stocks valuation. Maximizing company value through capital budgeting and selection of appropriate capital structure also are considered. The subject of risk and return, how funds are acquired in the financial markets and how different investment criteria are used to evaluate potential investment opportunities are also examined. Recommended: An accounting course or relevant background.

This course provides students with an understanding of financial statements for decision-making about cash flow, capital project investments, and management of a business organization. The course provides a conceptual understanding of financial data reported in various financial statements and of ratio analysis that can be used as analytical tools to interpret and obtain an understanding of the business and financial health of corporations. In addition, students will carry out a comparison of two corporations involved in similar businesses. Recommended: An accounting course or some knowledge of accounting.

This course is designed for personal financial planning. The topics in the course include goal setting, financial aspects of career planning, budgeting, credit cards, debt and money management strategies, types of savings, retirement plans, investments and tax strategies, insurance, factors that affect the home and car buying versus leasing, fundamentals of investments and various investment options. In addition, basics of estate planning for a lifetime of creating wealth will also be covered. BUS 1400 recommended.

This course is a practical introduction to investments for the individual investor. The course focuses on stocks, bonds, mutual funds, REITs, annuities and other investment alternatives. Emphasis is placed on how to determine the value of stocks and bonds. The course will impart knowledge of practical value to anyone interested in becoming actively involved in managing personal investments. The main goals of the course are to provide understanding of the essential features of various investment instruments, their risk-reward relationships, for whom and under what circumstances the instrument is appropriate and how the market operates for buying and selling the various investment instruments.

This course is designed to provide the student with an understanding of the foundations of the operations function in both manufacturing and services. The course will analyze operations from both the strategic and operational perspectives and highlight the competitive advantages that operations can provide for the organization. The emphasis is on decision making (to include business ethics) in areas such as: facility requirements and utilization, control and coordination of resource inputs and outputs, types of transformation/conversion processes, and performance measurements. Diverse activities, such as determining the size and type of production process, purchasing the appropriate raw materials, planning and scheduling the flow of materials and the nature and content of inventories, assuring product quality, and deciding on the production hardware and how it gets used will be the primary content areas of this class. NOTE: Students are strongly encouraged to first take Introduction to Management BUS 1200.

This course is an in-depth study of how and why people buy and gain an understanding of the factors influencing a purchase decision and how marketing research can enhance decision-making in this area. Topics include social structures and their effect on consumer purchase behavior, individual adoption and resistance behavior, and marketing efforts based on consumer research. Marketing research procedures, methods, and information sources are identified and evaluated. The ability to perform basic marketing research is emphasized.

This course is a study of the principles and practices of promotion for the business organization. Students will study the components and the interrelationships of the promotional mix: advertising, sales promotion, personal selling, direct marketing, and public relations. Topics include: an integrated marketing communications strategy, creative techniques of advertising, media strategies, and the evaluation of promotional plans.NOTE: Bus 1600 recommended

This course provides an introduction to the principles and practices of professional selling and sales management. Topics will include the steps of the sale; customer service; principles, issues and problems associated with managing a sales force; and ethics in selling. Problem solving techniques, monitoring of sales performance and sales simulations are examined. Bus 1600 recommended

In this course you will learn the process of launching a new business venture from an original or innovative idea. The focus will be on the stages of development of the new venture including research, planning, feasibility analysis, capitalization and management. Students will learn how to use resources to start and operate a small business. BUS 1200/2200: Principles of Management, BUS 1600/2600: Principles of Marketing and ACCT 2111: Financial Accounting are recommended to be taken before taking Entrepreneurship.

This course will provide flexibility in offering an in-depth review of topics of immediate importance and topical interest. These topics will go beyond the introductory courses in examining specific aspects of the subject matter.

This is a capstone course for students in a business program including: Accounting, Business Computer Systems and Management, Marketing, Management or Retailing. It includes practical, on-the-job training in a business or organizational environment under executive supervision and related learning activities. Internships are arranged on the basis of the student's interests and career goals. Please contact the instructor for permission to register for this class.

This course is designed primarily for the business major. This course will introduce you to business statistics, or the application of statistics in the workplace. In this course, you will learn how to apply statistical tools to analyze data, draw conclusions, and make predictions of the future. The course will begin with data distributions, followed by probability analysis, sampling, and finally hypothesis testing. This course is mathematically intensive, and much of what you learn here will deal with things you encounter every day. This course also makes use of spreadsheets, an important tool for working with and making sense of numerical data.

This course is an introduction to the functions of management: planning, organizing, directing, and controlling. The course explores how each of the management functions are implemented to impact organizational efficiency and effectiveness. Local, national, and global environments are presented as strategic factors to be understood by contemporary managers. The importance of managing competitively and intelligently within a diverse environment is stressed. Situational cases are completed to reinforce decision-making in each of the function areas.

This course provides a market-oriented perspective to business decision-making. Students will learn how marketers provide value in satisfying customer needs and wants, determine which target markets the organization can best serve, and decide upon appropriate products, services, and programs to serve these markets. Topics include branding and product development, pricing strategies, marketing research, promotion, supply chain management, and service marketing. Current trends and developments in marketing practices are analyzed and strategic marketing ideas are implemented within an ethical framework. Courses Recommended: BUS 1100 Introduction to Business and CIS 1101 Business Computer Systems I

This course is an introduction to the world of consumer behavior. Consumer behavior borrows from several social sciences to explain behavior in the marketplace. In this course, students will explore how perceptions, learning, memory, personality, and attitudes influence consumption behavior, how consumption shifts during ones life cycle, and how strong cultural and subcultural influences are on consumers.

This course is a study of the principles and practices of promotion for a business organization. Students will study the components and the interrelationships of the promotional mix: advertising, sales promotion, personal selling, direct marketing, and public relations. Topics include: an integrated marketing communications strategy, creative techniques of advertising, media strategies, and the evaluation of promotional plans. Students will complete the course with a comprehensive knowledge of and experience with how to develop an integrated promotional strategy.

This course introduces the principles and practices of professional selling. Topics will include the steps of the sale, identifying buying motives and customer needs, customer service principles, sales strategies, ethics in selling, and cultivating repeat business through service. Problem solving techniques, monitoring of sales performance, and sales simulations are examined.

This course will focus on the introduction and insights to a breadth of core and emerging digital channels and disciplines, including search engine optimization, website analytics, search and display ads, email marketing, social media, and social listening/monitoring.Designed to get students to think like a digital marketing professional, Fundamentals of Digital Marketing will help students establish habits for keeping up to date on emerging digital technologies relevant to business and to marketing, tie the use of digital marketing activities to business objectives, and identify and design data sources that allow students to track performance for digital marketing activities.Students will complete the course with a comprehensive knowledge of and experience with how to develop an integrated digital marketing strategy.

This course serves as the capstone for the Marketing Specialist Associates of Applied Science Degree. Students will integrate the concepts, techniques, and knowledge within marketing into a strategic marketing plan for an existing company. The strategic plan will be submitted and presented at the end of the course.