Department of Management and Decision Sciences

MANAGEMENT MAJOR

Management is the art and science of directing the operations of both individuals and organizations to achieve desired marketplace outcomes. Specifically, the overall function of management is often broken down into four general categories: planning, leading, organizing, and controlling. The overall effectiveness and efficiency of operations is generally credited to the ability to manage various organizational stakeholders successfully.

Although students may choose to pursue a general management major, and all management students share a common core set of management classes, students pursuing the management major may focus their attention into one of five concentrations to support their personal and professional goals: Entrepreneurial Management, Human Resource Management, International Management, Operations and Supply Chain Management, or Organizational Leadership.

Students completing the management major will have competencies in basic management principles and concepts including understanding the effects of a diverse environment on management decisions and effectively managing relationships.

Entrepreneurial Management

This concentration enables students to gain the necessary knowledge and abilities to be innovative and take action in starting a new business, joining a family or existing business, or helping to run a funds-generating enterprise in a non-profit or governmental agency. The courses that constitute the entrepreneurial management curriculum cover four key areas; entrepreneurial/innovation mindsets, opportunity/innovation implementation, entrepreneurial/innovation action-taking and entrepreneurial/innovation personal skill and knowledge development.

Human Resource Management

This concentration focuses on the skills and knowledge necessary to effectively utilize human capital to maximize organizational productivity, teaching students how to acquire, develop, and keep a talented, satisfied, and motivated workforce in small, medium, and large firms. Courses cover the fundamentals of employment law, staffing, training, leadership development, performance management, labor and employee relations, and total reward systems.

International Management

This concentration enables students to develop a broader understanding of the management of people, processes, and systems in a global economy. Students completing the international management concentration will be required to study abroad. In addition, students completing this concentration will be ineligible to complete the international business minor. Students taking this concentration are encouraged, but not required, to complete a cognate within global studies, Asian studies, foreign language, or other minor area of study to complement their learning.

Operations and Supply Chain Management

This concentration covers the techniques of operations management as it applies to organizing and managing the delivery of goods or services produced. It focuses on the tools, techniques, and models used to optimize plant or service outputs while controlling the delivery of material/ services into the process and the distribution of products/services out of the system. The impact of operations management in the day-to-day success of the organization is emphasized.

Organizational Leadership

Students that select this concentration will learn what it means to be a leader from a variety of perspectives in a variety of different organizational settings. Students will be exposed to essential concepts related to working with and leading others in small groups and teams. Students will reflect upon what it means to be an innovative and entrepreneurial leader and how this relates to their own abilities. In an experiential setting, students will lead both projects and people in an effort to develop personal leadership skills important to success in the diverse working environment that characterizes today’s workplace.

Student Learning Outcomes

1.1 General Management Knowledge

By the end of their capstone course, students will be able to demonstrate comprehension of the management process, organizational behavior, strategy and policy, international issues, and entrepreneurship.

1.2 Essential Managerial Tasks

Students should be able to distinguish among the four essential managerial tasks (planning, organizing, leading, and controlling).

2.1 Legal issues in Human Resources

Students should be able to identify how the legal context affects decisions about recruitment, selection, performance appraisal, compensation/benefits, and employee rights.

3.1 Teamwork Skills

Students should be able to demonstrate effective teamwork skills.

4.1 Gantt Chart

Students should be able to interpret a Gantt chart.

Programs

Majors/Degrees

Minors

Applied Creativity and Innovation Minor