Roadmap to success is the foundational course for the Business program. This course prepares learners for success in the degree program and promotes a journey towards lifelong learning. You’ll develop skills for communication, academic writing, self-discovery, career development and presentation skills.

This course is a hybrid competency-courses and introduces the learner to the competency-based model of Nexford courses in the BBA program.

The World of Business introduces the domain of business and key elements of the functional areas within the context that an organization operates. You’ll examine a variety of functional areas and types of business in order to understand their interconnectedness. Additional topics include the business cycle, global business practices, and impact on productivity.

Marketing Fundamentals is the foundational course for the Marketing specialization and is an introduction to the role of marketing in advancing the success of a product, service, experience or organization. Learners explore the evolution of marketing to include a review of the key marketing principles relevant in today’s workplace, an overview of the evolution from the traditional to digital marketing platform, and the differentiation between marketing a product or service versus marketing an experience.

You’ll examine functions and trends that are critical to staying competitive in the marketplace. This course introduces the functions of an organization for creating, communicating, and delivering value to customers. Designed to meet customers' needs and organizational goals, these functions include marketing and behavioral science research, environmental monitoring, target market selection, product selection, promotion, distribution and pricing.

Introduction to Business Law engages learners in understanding how laws, rules, regulations, and ethical standards pervade every area of business. This course provides an overview of U.S. law while considering that nearly all business concerns are global in nature in today’s ever-changing political and economic business environment. This course encourages learners to approach legal scenarios with an eye on international application.

Learners apply several key legal concepts to situations based on real-world legal conundrums and cases. Topics include, but are not limited to: contract law, business organization setup, employment law and intellectual property law. Learners thoroughly review and research legal concepts and apply knowledge to specific sets of legal issues found in the assigned professional scenarios.

Principles of Management focuses on how to create a personal and shared vision and communicate effectively with teams, as a leader, a manager and a team member. Topics include setting effective goals and expectations, understanding cultures and explaining the differences between management and leadership, team membership and leadership and the global workplace.

Financial Accounting focuses on the foundations of financial accounting concepts and methods used to generate, analyze, and interpret financial statements. Learners perform journal entries and record-keeping of transactions with an understanding of how these accounts are measured and reported in major financial statements.

Managerial Accounting and Cost Analysis focuses on the techniques managers use to identify and manage production costs for labor, material, and overhead. Learners engage multiple methods for budgeting and cost reporting, and calculate and interpret variances between budgets and actual results.

Advances in data collection, machine learning, and computational power have fueled institutional progress. The volume of available data has grown exponentially, and algorithms have continued to advance along with greater computational power and storage. As organizations become more inundated with data, having systems and processes in place to better understand and interpret data is highly important. This course focuses on how organizations can identify, evaluate and use data effectively. As consumers become increasingly savvy with their use of data, organizations need to change their responses. The use of data for all types of business from a large organization to a small retail shop will continue to become more sophisticated. This course provides an understanding of the data analysis process. Learners examine how technology has improved the ability to collect, analyze and interpret data, and they investigate data analysis tools and technologies to improve the decision making process.

Introduction to AI highlights the goal of artificial intelligence, which is to create software that can perform reasoning tasks and solve problems in complex environments the way humans do. This course begins with an overview of the evolution of AI tracing its history from the work of Alan Turing to the current state of the art software. Learners examine a range of AI techniques and their applications in business contexts, including knowledge representation, both basic and heuristic search, probabilistic modeling with Bayesian networks, and natural language processing techniques. Class discussions and readings address the philosophical and ethical implications of developing and deploying AI systems in a range of contexts. In the culminating course project, learners identify a problem or task that AI could effectively address, select and evaluate specific AI techniques, and identify and evaluate potential ethical questions surrounding the solution.

Unravel the mysteries of the global economy! This course equips you with the tools to understand the big picture: how economies function, why they grow or stumble, and how policies shape our world. Explore key concepts like GDP, inflation, unemployment, and international trade, and learn to analyze real-world economic events. Gain valuable skills in data interpretation, policy analysis, and economic modeling.

Ever wondered why gas prices fluctuate or how minimum wage laws affect your local coffee shop? This course reveals the economic principles behind these everyday decisions. Learn how individuals and businesses navigate the marketplace, from supply and demand dynamics to the impact of government policies. Gain the tools to analyze real-world problems through the lens of economic theory, making you a more informed consumer, citizen, and decision-maker.

Managing People Resources is the foundational course for the People Operations Specialization. This course provides an in-depth survey of concepts, skills and practices in people resource management. Learners are introduced to innovative approaches in human capital management at the local, national, and global levels.

The Business Career Branding for Success course engages learners in developing and strengthening the business and personal components of one’s own career brand. The learner takes the role of a “CEO” and uses business tools to analyze competitive strengths and weaknesses, create a competency profile, document high-demand marketable and transferable skills, craft a resume and develop a lifelong learning and career development plan that will be revisited throughout the degree program.

This course is divided into two parts: Part 1 is to establish a competitive benchmark pre-assessment and initial lifelong learning and career development action plan, and Part 2 enables the learner to re-evaluate competitive strengths and weaknesses, finalize the lifelong learning and career development action plan, and create a personal brand and business plan for the individual career path.

Organizational Relationships examines the interrelationships between business, government and society. Learners gain an understanding of how each of these entities contributes to the overall success of the organization, and if one of these areas is not in sync with the other two, the organization may not achieve its goals. Learners examine the interconnectedness of these three areas through topics of corporate social responsibility, business ethics, the regulatory climate, globalization, and the environment. A key focus of this course is connections between the developed and emerging markets. Learners examine how these markets rely on each other from multiple perspectives, including economics, culture, trade, human capital, etc.

Strategy and Organizational Planning examines how organizations set strategy and planning as key drivers of organizational success. In any domestic or international setting, the functions of strategy and planning are valuable resources in maintaining or expanding the competitive position. This course encourages learners to take a long-term view of the roles of strategy and planning whose concepts form the foundation for the practice of strategic management. Key topics covered include strategy analysis, strategic planning, and strategy implementation and evaluation. Both strategy and planning are boundaryless functions, thus allowing learners to examine these topics from the perspective of organizations operating in emerging markets.

Compensation & Benefits examines the development and administration of compensation and benefit practices, as well as challenges faced in managing total rewards in the multigenerational, competitive global economy. Learners analyze the strategic components of pay structures and reward systems and its impact on the employees and the organization.

Strategic People Operations prepares learners to apply the strategic management process from the Human Resource (HR) perspective. Learners examine how to manage talent effectively in the dynamic regulatory and competitive environment. The course emphasizes on integrating human resource management concepts related to the formulation and implementation of HR strategies and practices to support the overall global business strategy.

Digital Marketing Fundamentals provides an understanding of the digital marketing landscape, key trends impacting the industry, the changed customer journey, and the role each channel can play in that journey. The course also examines the advantages and subsequent challenges of this expanding marketing venue.

You’ll explore the tools that currently exist and the potential for future applications of the digital platform for marketing purposes. The course will further explore the digital platform as a tool for businesses in general in order to increase its levels of efficiency, effectiveness, and competitive position in the market space. You’ll also learn how to define and develop a digital strategy to help a business achieve its goals.

This course provides a survey of three types of capability transformations that enable digital transformation: people, tool, and process. At the people capability level, digital transformation requires the organization to hire and retain customer-centric and service-oriented talent; this talent search demands more collaboration and knowledge sharing while breaking down the silos between business and technology. At the tool capability level, a horizontal digital enabling layer is required to be developed, covering big data analytics, artificial intelligence, robotics, IoT, wearables, augmented and artificial reality, and modular manufacturing. Vertical business applications require digitization by the horizontal digital enablers in vertical business applications such as supply chain management, customer experience, finance and administration, and more. At the process capability level, digital transformation requires the business processes to be automated via the horizontal digital enablers.

Content Marketing and Social Media emphasizes the importance of content and how different content types can be used to support brand and business goals. You’ll identify not only the content type, but the literal content as well, in conjunction with a focus on the most appropriate demographic(s) for various content. Additionally, you will learn to develop a content strategy and create engaging content for the right audience and channel.

Auditing and Assurance Services focuses on how to plan and conduct an audit of a company’s financial statements and examines the importance of assurance services to users of financial statements. Learners apply techniques to identify and analyze evidence, identify fraud, and determine and publish an opinion report of the auditor’s findings.

Introduction to Entrepreneurship introduces learners to the concept of entrepreneurship by exploring the “Lean Startup” movement to help frame what a startup is and how learners can approach new markets and businesses from a product perspective. Learners evaluate a business idea, assess its viability in a broader market, and create a simple prototype to test the idea with customers.

Corporate Finance and Investment Analysis focuses on financial skills and analytical methods for corporate finance managers and investment analysts. Topics include corporate financial analysis, acquisition and allocation of capital, and financial statement reporting, as well as an exposure to investing in major asset classes, measures of risk and return, and methods for valuing equity and debt.

Project Management highlights a key tool for any organization, which is the ability to manage multiple projects simultaneously to positive results. This course examines from an organizational perspective the tasks associated with project management. The focus is on the four components of the project life-cycle in an international business setting: organizing, planning, monitoring and controlling. Learners identify and apply relevant project management tools and methods designed to execute projects in an effective manner that maximizes efficiency and minimizes cost.

Staffing and Development encompasses the activities involved in building and maintaining a workforce that meets the needs of the organization. The course focuses on managing talent during recruitment, selection, retention and development. Learners develop a plan to identify individual and organizational needs within the appropriate regulatory framework.

The Marketing Channels, Tactics, and Management course examines the contemporary range of marketing channels, common tactics unique to various channels, and how to plan an integrated approach to reach consumers at critical points. This course provides an overview of marketing channels with more focus on digital channels covered throughout the 360’ Marketing Certificate and Specialization. To deliver on the core components of any brand’s success, customers and stakeholders must feel assured that the brand exists, be clear on its offering, and see clear value in relation to themselves. Based on rapid changes in technology along with the way we distribute, consume and share media, understanding channel differentiators and designing an integrated marketing approach are essential for business goal attainment in today’s competitive landscape.

As the speed of globalization increases, organizations need to be increasingly focused on an integrated global business and culture; this course focuses on international business and the interconnectedness of a global culture.

Learners examine how an organization operating in the global environment needs to understand and appreciate how to best leverage both global and local cultures for responsible and successful business practices. Topics from the perspective of a global firm are related to management, leadership, the economy, financial reporting and regulatory compliance.