A secondary field of study apart from pursuing a major course can complement your bachelor’s degree. What you have to do is to pursue a minor. You may already have decided that you will continue with a business major. What can you do with a minor in business?
Well, a business minor can help you gain additional skills and experience to represent yourself in front of your employers. However, which business minor should you choose? Or, you might be looking for the requirements, career opportunities, and applications after pursuing a business minor.
Don’t worry because we have got all that you need to know. This guide will demonstrate what a business minor means, how you can qualify for a business minor, and the career opportunities you can create with one. Let’s get started.
Definition of a Business Minor
A minor refers to any student’s academic discipline while pursuing their bachelor’s degree at a school, college, or university. Thus, a business minor explicitly interprets a supplement or secondary field of study for students choosing business courses as their major.
The most important difference between a business minor and a major is the number of classes needed to complete the respective course. For example, most minors require up to 20 credits to complete the coursework. The major needs up to 60 credits for the student to accomplish their bachelor’s degree.
On the other hand, a few universities prioritise minor subjects for undergraduates if their primary major has comparatively lower credit requirements than what is asked for. In addition, students can include multiple minors in their study field. Thus, they can mention them in their resumes and get an advantage in securing jobs they anticipate.
Qualification Criteria for Students to Get a Business Minor
Can anyone get a business minor? Typically, any student pursuing a bachelor’s or undergraduate degree with a business major can apply for a business minor. So, there are no business minor requirements, but there’s a catch. Students have to choose a business minor that must complement their business major.
As a result, students with business majors like economics, finance, entrepreneurship, accounting, and marketing prefer to pursue related minors. However, business minors aren’t only popular among students pursuing business majors and individuals interested in interior design, visual art, etc.
In other words, business minors can be helpful for those who like to work in creative and intuitive fields that engage in working independently or freelancing. Depending on the requirements of the primary academic course, students with almost any major can apply for a business minor. However, one must ensure that major and minor coursework and classes don’t overlap.
What are some majors that go well with business minors? We have come across the following majors that can justify your interest in business minors:
Zoology
It’s possible to discover a bunch of positions in the Zoology department of different organisations after completing a bachelor’s degree with a Zoology major. On a related note, a business minor can boost your chances of getting selected even if you are a Zoology major student.
Business Administration & Management
A business minor might be a must-have for students in some universities. If you have taken Business Administration and Management, then a business minor can pair with it in the best possible way. You can prove your versatility and flexibility in your workplace with a business minor along with a major like Business Administration and Management.
Health and Medicine
Business minor courses can lift your career if you obtain a degree in Health and Medicine. Reportedly, a business minor makes you more resourceful as an employee.
Accounting
Students with an accounting major can apply for a diverse range of job positions. In addition, running your business gets easier with the right knowledge from a business minor.
Retail and Advertising
Do you want to apply for designations like market research analyst, brand manager, or advertising analyst? A related business minor can assist you in that and bring you under potential employers’ attention.
Courses Qualified as Business Minors
What should be your business minor courses? If you are stuck there, you can contact your college and universities to learn what business minors they offer. Remember that some specific business minor courses may contain more in-depth information and knowledge than others.
Hence, not all business minors reflect the exact value of yours on your resume or workplace. Now, let’s go through some common business minors chosen by most aspiring business students:
- Topics in Finance
- Entrepreneurship
- Business ethics
- Financial Accounting
- Product Marketing
- Risk Management
- International Business
- Investment Banking
- Personal ethics
- Business Law
- E-Commerce
- Principles of Economics
- Actuarial Science
- Supply Chain Management
- Consumer Behaviour and Patterns
- Principles of Accounting
- Market Research Methods
- Business Analytics
- Human Resources Management
- Business and Organisational Leadership Techniques
- Actuarial Mathematics
What Can You Do With a Business Minor?
Undoubtedly, your undergraduate majors can help you land a high-salary and reputed job position. However, adding a business minor can aid in the chances and even offer multiple designations to apply for. Let’s go through some common paths that you can pursue after graduation with a business minor:
Running Your Own Business
Are you thinking of opening a new business on your own? Then, a business minor can help you acquire the knowledge and skills required for running a business. On a related note, you can make informed decisions when you pursue the right business minor courses.
Marketing Yourself
Marketing your products and services takes work, but you can make this possible with an appropriate business minor. A business minor can give you the confidence and required skills to market your products and services to potential clients.
Data Analysis
Nowadays, everything needs data to make an informed decision. The same goes for a business, especially as it has to do much with budgeting, branding, locating prospective clients, and more. Moreover, a business minor can assist you in getting to know about tools for collecting and analysing data.
Jobs You Can Grab with a Business Minor
Most students aim to get more job opportunities as soon as they graduate, including business minor courses. What can you do with a business minor program? Since not everyone plans to start and run a business independently, you may be curious about what types of jobs you can qualify for with a business minor.
For better clarification, we have covered the most common job profiles suitable for individuals with business minors. You can check them out and pick your favourites.
1. Marketing Coordinator
A marketing coordinator is a professional who works on a company’s marketing strategy and maintains it. Well, you have to execute the following tasks as a marketing coordinator:
- Development of marketing ideas
- Engagement with vendors
- Research to identify new business opportunities
- Representing business information in convincing ways
- Planning trade shows
- Organisation of media strategies and more
As a marketing coordinator, you can expect an average annual salary of $45,736.
2. Accountant
A financial professional responsible for reporting and managing an organisation’s financial information is known as an accountant. So, you can opt for an accountant’s position after completing accounting minor business studies. However, an accountant has to execute the following duties:
- Assuring compliance with federal and state regulations
- Inspecting financial statements for accuracy
- Checking out financial obligations like advertising management and tax payments
- Risk analysis
- Budget preparation
- Assessment forecasting
- Finding out profit maximising strategies
On the other hand, accountants earn $55,867 per annum on average.
3. Social Media Manager
A company’s social media presence and reputation are important in maintaining brand consistency. As a social media manager, one has to develop and manage an organisation’s digital communication strategies on social media platforms.
Here are a few responsibilities of a social media manager:
- Interacting with customers and the public on diverse social media sites
- Examining the impact of social media campaigns
- Planning on how to extend the company’s social media reach
The national average salary of a social media manager is $48,533 per annum, by the way.
4. Human Resources Assistant
After graduating with a business minor course, you can apply for a human resources assistant position in a reputed companies. However, as a human resources assistant, you are entitled to perform the daily duties of a human resources department.
What are some common responsibilities of a human resources assistant? Here’s what we have found out, so far:
- Managing the hiring process
- Maintaining personnel files
- Tackling benefit policy and enrollment changes
- Answering employees’ questions
- Payroll processing
- Resolving conflicts
The national average salary of a human resources assistant is $40,225 a year.
5. Sales Representative
As the name suggests, a sales representative is liable to generate the company’s sales by promoting the company’s services and products to existing or potential customers. So, you need to perform the following job duties to qualify as a sales representative:
- Learning about services and products they promote to customers
- Demonstrating the products and services, including their benefits to the customer
- Understanding customers’ problems and resolving them
- Answering customers’ questions and providing information to make their doubts go away
- Conducting research regarding potential new customers
After all, a sales representative must learn to identify prospective customers and clients. Additionally, they need to maintain a credible relationship to cultivate future sales chances. However, on average, you can earn $64,629 annually as a sales representative.
6. Financial Analyst
Are you interested in planning investment finance and guiding a company’s financial strategies? Then, the job position of a financial analyst might be a suitable option for you after completing your business minor courses. As a financial analyst, you will typically be responsible for the following tasks:
- Study of economic trends
- Company’s financial data analysis
- Financial forecasting management
- Company’s financial data analysis
- Development of company’s financial strategy
- Identification of performance improvement opportunities
However, you can expect a national average salary of $67,694 per annum as a financial analyst.
In Conclusion…
Apart from the above job opportunities and positions, you can apply for a business analyst, entrepreneur, budget analyst, actuary, data scientist, marketing analyst, and more job positions with the right major and minor combinations for your graduation degree.
So, you can keep yourself ahead of others with the benefits of business minors. You can learn valuable skills, increase job opportunities, and make yourself ready with suitable business minors. Ensure that you select a business minor that supplements your major course.
