Syllabus

• Role or human resources management

  • Strategic role of human resources
  • Interdependence with other key business functions
  • Outsourcing
  • Human resource functions
  • Use contracts - domestic, global
• Key influences

  • Stakeholders - employers, employees, employer associations, unions, government organizations, society
  • Legal - the current legal framework
  • The employment contract - common law (rights and obligations of employers and employees), minimum employment standards, minimum wage rates, awards, enterprise agreements, other employment contracts
  • Work health and safety and workers compensation
  • Anti Discrimination and equal employment opportunity
  • Economic 
  • Technological
  • Social - changing work patterns, living standards
  • Ethics and corporate social responsibility
• Processes

  • Acquisition
  • Development
  • Maintenance
  • Separation
• Role of marketing

  • Strategic role of marketing goods and services
  • Interdependence with other key business functions
  • Production, selling, marketing approaches
  • types of markets  - resource, industrial, intermediate, consumer, mass, niche
• Influences on marketing

  • Factors influencing custom choice - psychological, sociocultural, economic, government
  • Consumer laws
  • Deceptive and misleading advertisements
  • Price discrimination
  • Implied conditions
  • Warranties
  • Ethical - truth, accuracy and good taste in advertising, products that may damage health, engaging in fair competition, sugging
• Marketing processes

  • Situational analysis - SWOT, product life cycle
  • Market research
  • Establishing marketing objectives
  • Identifying target markets
  • Developing marketing strategies
  • Implementation, monitoring and controlling - developing a financial forecast; comparing actual and planned results, revising the marketing strategy
• Marketing strategies

  • Market segmentation, product/service differentiation and positioning
  • Products - goods and/or services
  • Branding
  • Packaging
• • Price including pricing strategies - cost, market, competition based
  • Pricing strategies - skimming, penetration, loss leaders, price points
  • Price and quality interaction
  • Promotion
  • Elements of the promotion mix - advertising, personal selling and relationship marketing, publicity and public relations, sales promotion
  • The communication process - opinion leaders, word of mouth
  • Place/distribution
  • Distribution channels
  • Channel choice - intensive, selective, exclusive
  • Physical distribution issues - transport, warehousing, inventory
• • People, processes and physical evidence
  • E- marketing
  • Global marketing
  • Global branding
  • Standardisation
  • Customisation
  • Global pricing
  • Competitive positioning
• Role of operations management

  • Strategic role of operations management - cost leadership and good service differentiation
  • Goods and services in different industries
  • Interdependence with other key business functions
• Influences

  • Globalisation, technology, quality expectations,cost based competition, government policies, legal regulation, environmental sustainability
  • Corporate social responsibility
  • The difference between legal compliance and ethical responsibility
  • Environmental sustainability and social responsibility
• Operations processes

  • Inputs
  • Transformed resources - materials, information and customers
  • Transforming resources - human resources and facilities
  • Transformation process
  • The influence of volume, variety in demand and visibility (customer contact)
  • Sequencing and scheduling - Gantt charts, critical path analysis
  • Technology, task design and process layout
  • Monitoring, control and improvement
  • Outputs
  • Customer service
  • warranties
• Strategic role of financial management

  • Strategic role of financial management
  • Objectives of financial management
  • Profitability, growth, efficiency, liquidity, solvency
  • Short term and long term
  • Interdependence with other key business functions
• Influences on financial management

  • Internal sources of finance - retained profits
  • External sources of finance
  • Debt - short term borrowing (overdrafts, commercial bills, factoring), long term borrowing (mortgage, debentures, unsecured notes, leasing)
  • Equity - ordinary shares (new issues, rights issues, placements, share purchase plans), private equity
• Processes of financial management

  • Planning and implementing - financial needs, budgets, record systems, financial risks, financial controls
  • Debt and equity financing - advantages and disadvantages of each
  • matching the term and source of finance to business purpose
• Processes of financial management

  • Monitoring and controlling - cash flow statement, income statement, balance sheet
  • Financial ratios
  • Liquidity - current ratio
  • Gearing - debt to equity ratio
  • Profitability - gross profit ratio, net profit ratio, return on equity ratio
  • Efficiency - expense ratio, accounts receivable turnover ratio
  • Comparative ratio analysis - over different time periods, against standards, with similar businesses
• Processes of financial management

  • Limitation of financial reports - normalised earnings, capitalising expenses, valuing assets, timing issues, debt repayments, notes the financial statement
  • Ethical issues related to financial reports
• Financial management strategies

  • Cash flow management
  • Cash flow statements
  • Distribution of payments, discounts for early payment, factoring
  • Working capital management
  • Control of current assets - cash, receivables, inventories
  • Control of current liabilities - payables, loans, overdrafts
  • Strategies - leasing, sale and lease back
• Financial management strategies

  • Profitability management
  • Cost control - fixed and variable, cost centres, expense minimisation
  • Revenue controls - marketing objectives
  • Global financial management
  • Exchange rates
  • Interest rates
  • Methods of international payment - payment in advance, letter of credit, clean payment, bill of exchange
  • Hedging 
  • derivatives