A finance degree prepares future professionals to guide individuals, corporations, government agencies and other firms or organizations through financial struggles and uncertainty but also with short term and long term planning responsibilities. Finance majors complete a balance of theoretical and practical courses in a myriad of areas including business development, economics, organizational management, marketing, risk management, accounting, investments, supply chain, statistics and IT.
If you choose to complete a finance degree, know that it’s not simply a field of number crunching. You must also have problem-solving skills, an understanding of how the domestic and global markets function and the ability to think outside the box in order to best allocate and manage capital on behalf of your client or employer.
Our current recession presents an opportunity for recent high school grads, and career changers alike. Now more than ever, individuals, state & local governments, small businesses, and large corporations need educated business & finance professionals to plan for the future. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the job outlook for several finance careers looks very promising.
For example, the number of Financial Analysts and Personal Financial Advisors are expected to grow faster than average at 23% and 32% respectively from 2010-2020. The entry-level education for either of these careers, with median salaries ranging from $64,000-75,000 a year, is a Bachelor degree in Finance (or a related field). Financial managers earn significantly more with a median salary of $103,910, adds the BLS. These more executive positions are generally more competitive and normally open to those who have been in the field for five or more years.
The great thing about completing a finance degree is that it opens the door to numerous career paths; whether you see yourself working on behalf of individuals, companies, banking institutions or non-profit organizations – all are in need of a professional to create value out of their finances. If you are looking for a challenging, yet rewarding career, that embraces your quantitative and qualitative knowledge of markets, investments and capital then a business finance degree is for you.
