Business Management (including Foundation Year) - BSc (Hons)

University of Essex

Introduction to Management is a broad-ranging module intended to provide a foundation in the most significant issues in management theory and practice, as well as to prepare you for related modules in subsequent years of your course. Because theoretical explanations, i.e. academic interpretations of what managers do and even of what they say they do, and what managers actually do in real organisations on a day-to-day basis, may differ, we will also draw out some of the connections and disjunctures between management theory and management practice. Our teaching also emphasises the ethics of managing and how to balance the bottom line of the business with the organisation's wider responsibilities to society and other stakeholders. The module also looks to explore how AI is being employed by managers and how this is changing the roles and responsibilities of the managers across sectors whilst also creating new risks and challenges.

A key module across all our Business, Management, and Marketing courses Introduction to Marketing sets out the fundamental principles of marketing and covers the core elements of marketing management. The module explores marketing planning; the segmentation, targeting and positioning (STP) process; and the extended marketing mix (product, price, promotion, place, people, process, and physical environment). The module aims to help students develop marketing knowledge and skills that are important for future modules as well as the workplace.

It’s essential that every aspiring entrepreneur, manager and leader understands the basics of accounting and finance. In this introductory module you’ll explore the principles of financial and management accounting; the recording of transactions; the preparation of financial statements and their analysis; the principles of cost accumulation and decision making in businesses; techniques of cost control; the management of working capital; the sources of funding and investment appraisal. You’ll explore the key theories, carry out problem-solving exercises and learn how to apply these within companies.

If you’re looking to start your own business, or to help an existing business to grow, then this module provides the essential knowledge you’ll need. You develop a greater understanding of the various aspects involved in new venture creation and growth, from opportunity identification, evaluation and implementation through to continued growth and management. Using practical exercises, case studies and videos, you learn about the business life cycle from start-up to growth and maturity and explore business development from economic and behavioural perspectives.

This module introduces you to key economic theories and concepts, covering highly topical issues affecting the business world. Using real-life case studies, you explore the key microeconomics principles and concepts that can help to explain why economic activities occur and explore whether it is possible to improve economic situations for society.

At Essex Business School we’re proud of our international community, bringing international expertise into the classroom. In this module you are introduced to the global business environment and how this impacts upon corporations and their decision to operate internationally. You explore the different strategies organisations can adopt when entering international markets and examine aspects of managing multinational corporations, such as marketing, human resource management and global supply chain management.

Introduction to Business Analytics will allow you to develop core knowledge and skills in the domain of business analytics and data science. You’ll focus on different tools and approaches to support data analysis and decision making in business environment. The module is designed to enhance your ability of data analysis to uncover embedded information useful for decision making.Learn how to valuate the potential of data analytics in supporting complex decision making in real-world business environment.

This Professional and Academic Development module helps you build a foundation in core academic skill requirements to further improve the standard of your academic work across all of your first-year modules. This module also introduces you to the themes of career planning, employability skills, and awareness of career paths.

The Principles of Operations and Supply Chain Management module integrates topics from manufacturing-operations, process design, capacity and inventory planning, and supply chain management. This module will give you an opportunity to develop knowledge and skills to manage business operations and supply chain effectively in a real-world environment. The aim of this module is to provide comprehensive understanding of key principles, concepts and approaches used to ensure effective management of business operations and supply chain management. The module covers an extensive range of issues including structure and scope of operations, process design, capacity and inventory management, supply chain management and quality management.

This module builds on your understanding of management, work and organisation, exploring how these concepts have evolved over time and how they are understood now. You look at how management theory relates to organisational practice, examine the social dynamics underpinning the field of organisation studies and analyse some of the most important themes affecting management today.

This module introduces a number of business and management research methods, with a particular focus on entrepreneurship and small business. You explore philosophical research issues, such as selecting appropriate research methods and judging the quality and value of findings. You learn how to write a research proposal and design and plan quantitative and qualitative research. This includes collecting data, analysing findings and presenting results.

This module will give you a clear understanding of feedback, Dweck`s concept of a `growth mindset`, and how you can use these to improve your studies and career. We want you to have a passion for learning, a willingness to challenge yourself, and an eagerness to learn from mistakes, so this module will help you to understand group work and presentations and to acquire the relevant skills to successfully undertake both. The module also serves as a bridge for your final year, so that students should be able to understand the expectations of the final year and the possible career paths you can take after you graduate, and how you can use summer vacations to get ahead.

The business world is increasingly global, complex and fast changing. While some organisations are consistently successful over a long period of time, many fail and are forgotten forever. In theory it should become consecutively easier to imitate the strategies of winning companies and dissipate their profits. In practice, however, only a few firms become long-term leaders. In this course, you explore why that is.

The module aims to develop your understanding of leadership in organisations. You explore a range of traditional and current leadership theories and relate these to business and managerial practice. You also examine business ethics and develop your teamwork, critical thinking, and problem-solving skills.

This module explores the ethical dimensions, societal implications, and practical considerations of implementing Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the organisations and analytics context. It focuses on key themes such as fairness, transparency, privacy, and accountability, while examining fundamental concepts like algorithmic fairness, transparency, and ethical decision-making. Engaging with debates around AI autonomy, bias mitigation, and regulatory frameworks, students will develop a comprehensive understanding of the responsible AI landscape.

Political, economic, and socio-cultural changes have culminated in the emergence of Human Resource Management (HRM) as a distinct function within many organisations. In particular, HRM has taken an increasingly strategic view of the organisations' employees as drivers of competitive advantage with primary HRM functions including recruitment and selection, performance and reward management, and training and development, which are correspondingly aligned with this aim. This is also accompanied by an increasing emphasis being placed on a host of new devolvement's including the use of digitised employee management systems and an emphasis on promoting organisational sustainability. This module will explore existing theories and approaches to contemporary strategic HRM, while also adopting a critical perspective on their impact and implementation. In doing so, it will consider how institutional and cultural contexts shape the ways in which employer-employee relationships are constructed, enforced, and normalised and will seek to highlight and explain the oft-observed gaps between theory and practice. This will enable you to develop a critical appreciation of strategic HRM challenges and an understanding of its potential impact on individuals, organisations, and the wider society.

This module builds on your understanding of management and organisation by considering the ethics of business activity. You are introduced to the origins, practice and theory of business ethics and corporate social responsibility (CSR). You consider a range of perspectives and use business literature to critically examine organisational ethics and analyse its constraints. This module has been designed to enable students to integrate their subject knowledge with an understanding of sustainable development, acquiring the skills and competencies essential for addressing the urgent sustainability challenges of the 21st century.

This module will help you to understand the interests, skills and competencies which are relevant to your future career choices. You will learn how to find the graduate-level roles and career paths available to business students and you will learn about the skills necessary to successfully compete in the graduate labour market after you graduate.