Business Studies

Business Studies at Key Stage 5

Exam board: OCR

Why study Business Studies?

No matter what your aim, Business Studies gives you an incredibly powerful start to launch you on the way to becoming a business person. All the key topics of starting and running a business are covered. Armed with this knowledge maybe you could give Alan Sugar a run for his money!
Of course not everybody wants a global corporation. A lot of people prefer small businesses offering individual service or set up their own business,working for themselves. Whether you’re selling homemade candles or starting your own e-company, you still need to know about business. Like how to get your products to market, how to price them, how to promote them and how to get paid. It’s all here.

What will you study?

Year 12 AS Units
An introduction to business: Students gain an appreciation of the nature of business, learn how businesses can be classified, seewhat the objectives of businessmay be and consider other influences on business.
Business functions: Students gain an appreciation of different aspects of business including the marketing function, the role of accounting and finance, issues relating to people within organisations and the principles of operations management.

Year 13 A2 Units
People in organisations: Students will appreciate how people function within business organisations with the focus on
communication, organising and controlling individual activity, relations between employers and employees, employee participation,methods of remuneration, training, appraisal and the criteria for measuring workforce performance.
Strategic management: Students will appreciate how business objectives and strategy are formulated and applied. Students will also appreciate issues relating to business analysis. A range of external influences will be considered as well as how organisations deal with change.

Method of assessment

All units are assessed through a timetabled written examination.
The popular case-study approach to assessment is used in all assessments.

Examinations sittings are available every January and June.

Future prospects

Likewe said in the introduction, this A Levelwill get you started in business... and give you the skills and knowledge to progress to higher education. You could work for a corporation, or maybe a management consultancy.
All businesses (and other organisations like charities and hospitals) need sound business skills behind them.