Business and Finance (top up award) BA (Hons)

This module is designed for business students to develop a non-technical understanding of the key aspects of corporate financial theory and practice. The module covers the core aspects of raising capital and determining financing, though to investing capital in major corporate decisions, and finally returning value to shareholders.

Specifically you will study in the module; Sustainable Value Management, Stock Market Efficiency, Capital Asset Pricing Model, Portfolio Theory, International Cost of Capital, Capital Structure Decisions, Dividend Policy, Corporate Valuation and International Merger & Acquisition activity.

The module has a focus on business responsibility of all of those areas, concentrating on professional codes of conduct in areas such as the banking industry, accounting and similar finance areas, and the types of dilemmas that graduates could face in professional practice. This module will develop you as a critical and reflective practitioner. In the module you will become more aware of the issues that responsible businesses face when attempting to implement financial concepts and theories into practice.

On completion of this module you will have produced a reflective learning journal (in the form of a Blog) based on your evaluation of theory to real world scenarios. As part of that journal will have watched and reflected on appropriate financial documentaries and movies which explore responsible financial management issues. Finally you will be apply your academic knowledge to a real world case and be able to critically evaluate the tensions between the financial academic theories as a responsible business attempts to maximise shareholder wealth.
critically evaluate the tensions between the financial academic theories as a responsible business attempts to maximise shareholder wealth.

In this module, you will learn and examine the banking risk faced by banks and financial institutions. This module takes you through the specific areas of credit and market risks within the context of the relevant regulatory framework (The Basel Accords) and draws on case study material provided by high profile banks and financial institution. You will be expected to develop an understanding of the nature of credit and market risks, its measurement models and management issues. The module will cover:
• A typology of risk in banking and financial institutions- definitions, types, and its importance. Discussion on certainty, risk and uncertainty.
• International banking regulation and capital adequacy
• The nature and significance of market risk
• Measuring market risk through Value-at-Risk (VaR) models (variance-covariance, historical simulation and Monte-Carlo simulation models), back-testing, stress-testing, bootstrapping, expected shortfall and other regulatory models.
• Market risk regulatory framework using the Basel Accords.
• Exchange rate risk and its implications in banking.
• Credit decision making and credit risk in consumer and industrial loans.
• Measuring credit risk through credit scoring models, credit VaR models (Creditmetrics, Creditrisk+).
• Credit risk regulatory framework using the Basel Accords.
• Counterparty Credit Risk (CCR) in derivatives and credit valuation adjustment (CVA).

You will learn how to read and critically interpret both the financial information and narrative content of company reports. To do this, you will study the theory and context of corporate reporting, including ethical issues, and the international framework for reporting, as well as very practical techniques such as ratio analysis. Building on the calculation of ratios studied in previous modules, you will use ratios to help you analyse a company’s performance by selecting appropriate comparators and considering the figures in the context of a company’s industry and its business strategy. You will also consider the role of integrated reporting and sustainability reporting.

You will study impression management theories and apply these to evaluate how companies present themselves in their corporate reports.

The syllabus includes:
• regulatory and ethical framework, including the Conceptual Framework for Financial Reporting
• Generally Accepted Accounting Practice (GAAP) and convergence towards International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS)
• the constituent elements of financial statements: balance sheets, income statements, cash flow statements, statements of changes in equity, notes to the accounts and accounting policies, and how to interpret these
• other elements of the annual report, such as the corporate governance report and auditor’s report, and how to interpret these
• progress in integrated reporting and sustainability reporting
• efficient market hypothesis, and how the market views the information in corporate reports
• impression management in corporate reporting
• current issues arising

Academic skills when studying away from your home country can differ due to cultural and language differences in teaching and assessment practices. This module is designed to support your transition in the use and practice of technical language and subject specific skills around assessments and teaching provision in your chosen subject. The overall aim of this module is to develop your abilities to read and study effectively for academic purposes; to develop your skills in analysing and using source material in seminars and academic writing and to develop your use and application of language and communications skills to a higher level.

The topics you will cover on the module include:

• Understanding assignment briefs and exam questions.
• Developing academic writing skills, including citation, paraphrasing, and summarising.
• Practising ‘critical reading’ and ‘critical writing’
• Planning and structuring academic assignments (e.g. essays, reports and presentations).
• Dissertation writing requirements
• Research Skills
• Ethical considerations
• Understanding research limitations
• Avoiding academic misconduct and gaining credit by using academic sources and referencing effectively.
• Listening skills for lectures.
• Speaking in seminar presentations.
• Presenting your ideas
• Giving discipline-related academic presentations, experiencing peer observation, and receiving formative feedback.
• Speed reading techniques.
• Developing self-reflection skills.

You will learn advanced academic skills; such as how to use structured approaches to read, note-making, research and writing, transferable skills to ensure academic success in all your other academic modules and enabling you to conduct a critical literature review of employability, graduate marked place informed by career theory (see themes 1,2 and 3 below). Then using advanced research skills, theory and self-assessment tools you will learn how to and choose and apply for a relevant job role and career path, in turn enhancing your employability and transferable academic skills (themes 4 and 5). Finally, you will conclude the module by designing a complete set of graduate application tools for the job role and career chosen and will experience a no of recruitment exercises such as interviews, group exercises and self-branding and presentation to further develop your employability, academic performance and career management skills. The module will be concluded with a theoretical session and a number of practical exercises designed to develop your self-confidence and employability (theme 6).

Theme 1 – Introduction and advanced study skills
1. Introduction to advanced study skills and career development.
2. Searching for and critically evaluating academic and professional sources.
3. Critical analysis of information and data.
Theme 2 – Understanding the graduate labour market and employers
4. Understanding the global graduate labour market.
Theme 3 – What employers want from graduates and how to achieve it?
5. Enhance business awareness, networking, cultural sensitivity and global mind sets.
Theme 4 – Choose career path
6. Understanding and choosing suitable career paths.
Theme 5 – Design career personal development plan
7. Design a career personal development plan using the NU (ELA) framework.
Theme 6 - Recruitment, selection and employability/application tools
8. An introduction to recruitment and selection processes.
9. Development of skills and tools to enable students to demonstrate effective self-presentation.
10. Develop techniques and practice to excel at interviews.
11. Self-confidence and Employability: Conclusions and introduction to the extended critical literature review module that follows.
12. Assignment surgery

On this module, you will learn about critical thinking and reflection, and doing so, you will develop the necessary critical skills to perform both of these effectively as a learner in higher education. You will learn about the necessary academic skills required to undertake a critical review of existing literature on a contemporary issue within the business and management disciplines. On completing this, you will be able to a critical literature review on a subject appropriate to your degree programme.

Here, you will be introduced to the module, before identifying how to select a contemporary issue within business and management. You will learn about the development of critical thinking and what is meant by a literature review as well as the importance of being able to write a literature review.

You will learn how to get started in this development; by searching for sources and developing essential research skills including reviewing literature and critical evaluation, before going onto develop you own critical literature review which represents the module assessment.

This is a non-credit bearing module, and forms an extension to the 120 module credit points on your top-up programme. The module is designed to provide greater understanding of academic expectations for your direct entry into the final year and support you in the transition process of learning experience.

The aim of the module is to facilitate the development of your independent learning over the one-year course. Induction and on-going personal support activities are to be phased in line with the academic development and the need to support the delivery of programme modules.

In personal support, you will cover:
• The key support and points of contact available to you within the institution
• Societies and social wellbeing
• Library resources and academic skills
• ARTA regulation
• Teamwork protocol
• Use LinkedIn to network

In academic development, you will cover:
• Emailing tutors
• Introduction to referencing
• Finding and evaluating sources
• APA reference guide
• Paraphrasing, summarising and writing critically
• Reporting words, cohesion/linking
• Combining sources
• Conclusions, abstracts and marking criteria

On completion of this module, you should be able to complete the process of transition directly to the final year. This will include your personal and academic development activities. You will also be able to seek learning resources and study support, including academic and social integration.

You will learn how organisations can compete successfully in economic terms while managing their corporate, social and environmental responsibility. At the end of the module you will learn to critically evaluate the factors which underpin an organisation’s success (or otherwise) in managing the triple bottom line and will have learned how to use appropriate frameworks to analyse research material and draw useful conclusions.

This module aims to provide you with a detailed understanding of the financial management peculiarities of SMEs, young entrepreneurial ventures and growing businesses. Apart from offering an overview of potential sources of finance for small businesses, this module also looks into the specific problems and opportunities that SMEs (small & medium enterprises) face in the financial environment. You will learn to view SME financial issues as distinct from those of large organisations and to critically analyse particular situations of SME business in the real world.
In the module you will engage with the following main topics:
- Financial analysis: starting from simple concepts, this is aimed at understanding how to make decisions from financial numbers.
- Finance gaps: understanding start-up funding as well as expansion funding needs; Working capital funds; Why is cash flow critical and how to optimise it.
- Overcoming finance gaps: Equity and debt funding; Different funding sources, their conditions and emphases, e.g., banks, venture capital/ business angels, crowd funding platforms. How do investors do their due diligence? What value-add do investees get from different investors?
- Negotiating funding; valuing an SME.
- International business, Foreign currency risk and SME
- Harvesting your investment; Investor exit.
- Ethics and responsible decision making in SME and SME finance

The module will give you the ability to understand in depth issues in running any SME business and the confidence in running your own business. Specifically, on completing the module, you will be able to:
? evaluate critically and identify problems in the operation and growth of an SME by analysing the ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ aspects of finance
? generate different remedies that relate to financial and non-financial areas of running an SME business
? compare the appropriateness of sources of finance and financial support for an SME and recommend appropriate choices
? evaluate foreign currency risks and make choices to minimise them
? appreciate ethical and responsible behaviour regarding finance/ SME finance decisions