Business Core (BCOR)

The LMU College of Business Administration aims to "advance knowledge and develop business leaders with moral courage and creative confidence to be a force for good in the global community." This course is a transformational experience for incoming undergraduate students that begins their journey toward a business degree and beyond, focusing on the role of business as a force for good.

The course is an immersive and interactive experience with the following elements. It involves the major global challenges that you will face in your professional careers, such as poverty and the environment, and brings out the role of business in being a force for good in addressing these challenges as well as in a broad array of issues. It involves a project where you will design a business plan to launch of a product for low-income customers in domestic or international markets, while achieving economic sustainability as well as social and environmental sustainability. It involves doing good as being at the heart of the business rather than as corporate social responsibility. It involves working with companies. And most importantly, it will involve examining your values as it relates to doing good in the professional and personal realms. The course will culminate in a poster session. In short, you will start out your careers by having all of these challenges to confront in your first semester.

This course involves the study of financial accounting. Students are introduced to 1) the role of financial accounting and reporting in business and society, 2) the basic concepts and techniques of financial accounting, and 3) the preparation and use of financial statements. Topics covered include accrual basis of accounting, the financial accounting cycle, internal controls, ratio analysis, and the reporting and analyzing of financial statement elements.

Prerequisites: BCOR 1910 (or may be taken concurrently) and MATH 110 or MATH 112 or MATH 120 or MATH 131, all with a minimum grade of C (2.0).

This course involves the study of managerial accounting. Accounting information is used by management to make decisions that guide the organization through planning, organizing, directing, and controlling activities. Decision making requires a future orientation to the information, with relevant and flexible data. Topics covered include cost classification, costing and pricing, estimation models, cost-volume-profit analysis, segment reporting, performance evaluation, operational and capital budgeting, and non-routine business decisions.

Prerequisites: BCOR 2110 or BCOR 1910 and MATH 112 or MATH 120 or MATH 131, all with a minimum grade of C (2.0).

A survey course on the general concepts found in Business Law. The student will be exposed to legal and regulatory terminology, corporate structures, legal responsibilities, concepts, and reasoning found when working within the business and government environment.

Prerequisite: BCOR 1910 with a minimum grade of C (2.0).

The course will be devoted to problem-solving and acquiring personal productivity software skills for effective and efficient use in business and organizations. The course will introduce students to key concepts in MIS (Management Information Systems) and enhance understanding of the issues that business organizations face when developing and managing information systems. Emphasis is on use of information technology for business problem-solving and creating business opportunities. Specifically, the course will introduce students to:

- Application software (e.g., Excel) for solving business problems
- Basic concepts of business data communications
- Relational Database Management Systems (DBMS), like Microsoft Access, for creating database solutions that can support and transform business processes
- The use of information technology to formulate strategy and foster innovation
- The design and implementation of systems in organizations
- Web site design using a content management system or cloud-based services

This course will also examine emerging technologies and IT trends. By completing the course, students should be better equipped to understand the role of IT in solving business problems, to participate in IT projects, and to communicate more knowledgeably with IT experts.

Prerequisite: BCOR 2110 or 1910.

This course focuses on problem-solving and the development of software skills for the efficient use of technology in business environments, with a particular emphasis on accounting and finance functions (e.g., Excel). Students will be introduced to key concepts in Management Information Systems (MIS) while exploring how businesses use information systems to streamline operations and drive decision-making. The course will also cover the fundamental principles of IT development, management, and the growing role of data analytics in accounting and finance. Students will learn how to leverage data analytics tools to interpret financial data, identify trends, and make informed decisions. The course will also examine emerging technologies, IT trends, and their implications for business practices. By the end of the course, students will be equipped to make IT-related decisions, participate in IT projects, and effectively communicate with IT professionals, especially in the context of accounting and finance.

Prerequisite: BCOR 2110 or 1910.

This course introduces students to finance, primarily from a corporate perspective. The principal objective of the course is for students to develop an understanding of the basic tools of financial analysis and how to use them to make decisions. Students will learn how to incorporate time value of money and financial projections into their analyses.

Prerequisites: BCOR 2110 and ECON 1050 (or ECON 1100 and ECON 1200), ECON 2300 or ECON 2350 or MATH 104, and MATH 112 or MATH 131, all with a minimum grade of C (2.0).

This course covers the essential principles of marketing as a vital component of a business operation. It emphasizes marketing's strategic bases and the real-world utilization of both traditional and innovative techniques that influence both the trade and the consumer in making a purchase decision. The course includes a focus on using marketing as a force for good, incorporating the effects of uncontrollable factors in the global environment as well as basic controllable variables essential to marketing success. These include the ethical creation, communication, and exchange of value through product decisions, pricing, distribution, and promotion. We will explore how marketing analysis guides business strategy, discovers and creates demand for products, and influences product development.

Prerequisites: BCOR 1910 and ECON 1050 (or ECON 1100 and ECON 1200) and MATH 112, all with a grade of C (2.0) or higher.

This course provides future leaders and managers with a basic understanding of theories and principles of Organizational Behavior (OB) and their proactive applications in critical Human Resource Management (HRM) responsibilities for the effective management of employees, teams, and organizations. Included are key and socially responsible management practices in planning, organizing, and controlling for achieving organizational goals and objectives, as well as in creating a high-quality work environment for attracting, developing, and retaining human talent.

Prerequisite: BCOR 1910 and MATH 112, with a minimum grade of C (2.0).
Must be taken in residence at LMU.
University Core fulfilled: Flag: Engaged Learning.

This course introduces students to decision making and model building in the management of operations which create products and/or services. The principles of operations management apply throughout the world to all productive enterprises. Efficient production methods require the effective application of the concepts, tools, and techniques that are covered in this course. Hands-on learning is an important feature of the course. A project case analysis will require students to collect, organize, and analyze data to provide recommendations for how to improve the performance of a specified operating or supply chain system.

Prerequisites: ACCT 3140 or BCOR 2710/2720, and ECON 2300 or MATH 104 and MATH 112.
University Core fulfilled: Flag: Quantitative Reasoning.

This course introduces students to international business environments, concepts, and practices. In order to understand complex issues related to global economy, students will learn about national and regional differences in political, economic, and socio-cultural systems. To acquire skills and knowledge necessary for managing international business operations, students will study international trade and investment theories and policies, foreign exchange mechanisms and markets, as well as global strategies in manufacturing, marketing, and human resources management.

Prerequisite: ECON 1050 (or ECON 1100 and ECON 1200) and MATH 112.

Business Ethics and Sustainability focuses on the interaction and importance of social, political, economic and environmental forces in business and society. Using the framework of the UN Sustainable Development Goals, students will study the moral responsibility of business for societal and environmental impacts. Emphasis is placed on applying ethical decision models to a variety of stakeholder issues, which will include a substantial investigation into the underlying normative ethical theories and socio-political factors that impact business' broader responsibilities.

Prerequisites: BCOR 2710, BCOR 3410, BCOR 3510, BCOR 3610, BCOR 2120, and BCOR 2210, all with a minimum grade of D (1.0) and an average grade of C (2.0) across all four courses.
Must be taken in residence at LMU.
University Core fulfilled: Integrations: Ethics and Justice; Flag: Writing.

This applied course develops strategic thinking skills that enable managers to position the business to achieve and sustain superior competitive performance. This course addresses issues of both strategy design and implementation in the complex global economic environment. The course requires students to draw upon and integrate knowledge and skills developed throughout their business education.

Prerequisites: BCOR 3410, BCOR 3510, BCOR 3610, BCOR 2120, and BCOR 2210.
Must be taken in residence at LMU.