I am wondering, if ACCOUNTING is the right step to go if I wish to go to business school upon completion of undergrad, and one day own my a business. I know there are others majors to choose from such as marketing, management, CIS etc…but I find that accounting is the most fundamental set of skills that a small business owner (probably no other employees initially) can have. I know there are also studies in entrepreneurship, but it seems too risky in that in case your business fails, it may be hard to find a job with your given credentials. So my questions is, to all of the current small business owners out there, whats the best area of study that I should focus on if I wish to start and run a small business one day (also keep in mind that possibility of the business failing and having to find a real job). Is it feasible to major in accounting, get CPA license, and focus on a totally diff area of study in grad school?
Finance might be a better major because it is a bit less structured than accounting and focuses more on problem solving than the GAAP, which seems more important if you’re running your own business. Most people I know who want to go into business for themselves are in Finance. Secondly you can major in folk art and still go get an MBA. In fact, most MBA are not even business undergrad majors. At my school’s MBA school only about 1/3 of all the students have BBA’s.
I’m not sure how much your undergraduate major matters when trying to get into business school. I would guess more important things would be GPA, work history, test scores, and things like that would be looked at more closely than your major. If you majored in something outside of the business field, like art, then you might have to take some pre-requisites.
In a recent lecture in my management course the professor mentioned (in passing) that he thinks business administration is the best major, because you get exposure to all aspects of business. I’m majoring in business administration, so I was happy to hear that. Accounting is important and even if you aren’t doing bookkeeping, being able to know how to read balance sheets and income statements are useful.
Personally I had a terrible time with accounting. I didn’t like my professor (nice lady, not the best teacher), and I’m bad with numbers to begin with, so it was a recipe for disaster. While accounting is important, I think it can be terribly boring, and not just to me personally. Make sure that it’s something you’re interested in, don’t just do it because you think it would be “useful”.
Majoring in business administration might be what you’re looking for. Talk to your academic advisor or use some other resource on campus to find out what would be the best fit for you.