What topics should be covered in the first two-year common core of business programs?
Faculty Survey Analysis
Daniel Lee
October 8, 2019
Major findings
- According to the survey, the first two-year core curriculum should cover such topics as
cash flow,balance sheet,income statement,financial statementandsupply and demand. For example,cash flowtopped the list with 10 votes from 16 people who responded to the survey. - When examined by discipline, the survey stressed:
income statement,balance sheet, andcash flowin the area of accounting;Supply and demandin economics;cash flowandfinancial statementin finance;contract lawandconstitutional law;marketing research,viral marketing,marketing plan,market research,customer segmentation, andconsumer behaviorin marketing.
Limitations
- It is possible that the survey results may be biased in favor of the discipline whose faculty submitted individually as opposed to as a group. The size bias of the discipline may also be caused by the actual relative size of the discipline in our business academic unit.
- This survey lacks information about universal skills that can be taught in multiple disciplines. Good examples include
critical thinking,communication skills, andquantitative reasoning. Therefore, this survey should be used in conjunction with other analyses.
About the sample
The returned surveys appears to be representative of the business academic unit. A total of 16 surveys returned from 11 different disciplines. No more than three surveys received from a discipline. Some disciplines indicated that they completed the survey as a group and returned one response per discipline (Finance, Accounting, Law, and Sports Management). If sales can be put in marketing as one discipline, the sample seems a bit heavy on marketing.
| discipline_surveyee | number_responses |
|---|---|
| Accounting | 1 |
| Economics | 1 |
| Entrepreneur | 1 |
| Finance | 2 |
| Law | 1 |
| Management | 2 |
| Marketing | 3 |
| OrgBehavior | 1 |
| OrgComm | 1 |
| Sales | 2 |
| SportsMan | 1 |
The most common words
The most common words, Overall
The word, marketing topped the list. Of 16 survey responses, 13 included the word, marketing. It’s followed by statement that was mentioned by 12 people. Of course, statement can mean different topics (i.e., income statement and financial statement). The analysis of bigrams will likely provide a clearer picture.
The most common words, by discipline
The chart below shows the most common words by discipline. For example, nine people mentioned the word, supply under economics.
The most common bigrams
The most common bigrams, Overall
According to the survey, the most important topics that should be covered in the first two-year core curriculum are cash flow, balance sheet, income statement, financial statement and supply and demand in that order. For example, 10 out of 16 people who responded to the survey consider cash flow to be covered in the first two-year core curriculum.
The most common bigrams, by discipline
When examined by discipline, the survey stresses income statement, balance sheet, and cash flow in the area of accounting. Supply and demand appears to be the top topic in economics. Interestingly, cash flow and financial statement show up in two disciplines: accounting and finance.
Visualizing a network of the most common bigrams
It only includes bigrams that were mentioned by at least two people.
Digging deeper: case of bigram, “cash flow”
The most frequent bigram is “cash flow”. It was mentioned in 13 different sentences in 10 different people representing nearly all disciplines in the business academic unit. See below for the actual responses that contain “cash flow” and the names of surveyees.
## [1] "General Journal, General Ledger, Trial Balance, Adjusted Trial Balance, Adjustments, Income Statement, Balance Sheet, Statement of cash flow, Closing process, Retained Earnings, Post closing trial Balance, pro-forma financial statement, Master Budget, Variance Report, ."
## [2] "To discuss the nature of cash flow and to explain how to draw up such a document"
## [3] "Examine and understand the 4 main financial statement: Income Statement, Balance Sheet, Statement of Shareholder Equity and Statement of cash flow"
## [4] "Explore the importance of cash flow."
## [5] "Examine the use of free cash flow in measuring and creating value for the firm."
## [6] "Accounting cycle; merchandise accounting; balance sheet and income statement; assets, liabilities, and stockholders’ equity; financial statement analysis. Chart of Accounts; Debits and Credits; Balance Sheet, Income Statement, and Cash Flow; allocation of fixed and variable costs; standard cost structures; contribution margin analysis ."
## [7] "Cash Flow"
## [8] "Cash Flow"
## [9] "Understand basic finance terms like assets and liabilities, cash flow, stocks versus bonds,"
## [10] "Cash Flow"
## [11] "To discuss the nature of cash flow and to explain how to draw up such a document"
## [12] "The basics of an accounting ledger, debits, credits, separation of duties to avoid theft. Cash flow."
## [13] "Statement of cash flow, balance sheet, bear and bull markets, ROI, NPV, fed reserve, mutual funds, The 4 types of option: put or call, long or short. If they end up in a career working for Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, Fidelity, Edward Jones and understanding of sales skills with an emphasis on discovery questions and relationship building would serve them well in retaining more clients, more of their client share wallet, additional revenues. Even in a pure non-sales role, those employees who are client facing will have the ability to influence outcomes like renewing the services, and contracts their firm (their employer) is offering to the client. AND they could develop additional business offering more services, this drives both revenues and retention to lock out competitors. As a result, these employees will get promoted faster, and make junior partner or partner faster."| name_surveyee |
|---|
| groupAccounting |
| FrederickHoward |
| groupFinance |
| HumerRoss |
| WrightRoxana |
| BrownsteinDeborah |
| PetinicoGeorge |
| PorterRon |
| EnglandRay |
| NadeauRobert |