Careers in Business Administration

While business has been around since the dawn of civilization, business administration as a specific field is less than 200 years old. The first "business school" opened in 1819 in Paris, but the school, the French ESCP (École Supérieure de Commerce de Paris), was simply dedicated to teaching economics and finance. It was not until years later, after the Industrial Revolution, that a number of American schools started teaching systemic approaches to management. These scientifically-born business theories have since grown and evolved into today's business administration.

Business administration schools and those choosing a career in business administration now deftly handle topics like international business, information technology, leadership dynamics, supply chain management and operations management. As business administration theories become more refined and as technology and globalization have caused the business world to shrink with increasing rapidity, more and more emphasis has been put on keeping pace with the constant innovations and expansion.

Perhaps the most overt example of the way business administration has adapted to fit the needs of the business world and the world at large is the increasing focus on ethical and environmentally-sound business procedures. While good management has always encompassed ethical business and leadership practices, recent business scandals—from Adelphia to WorldCom to Enron—have brought urgent attention to the importance of business ethics. In response, a number of business administration programs around the country have added ethics courses that draw on both the wisdom of world philosophers and the lessons evident in the case histories of notorious rule-breakers. According to Forbes.com, the University of California Berkeley's Haas School of Business has even organized field trips for MBA candidates to a local prison to inspire their corporate social responsibility.

Many businesses and business administration programs have also realized that as the basis of—and thus trendsetters in—the world economy, they have a responsibility to address the grim realization that our climate is changing. A survey run by Net Impact, a nonprofit organization devoted to supporting business leaders who want to make a positive impact on their communities and the world, reported that 81 percent of MBA students think that businesses should increase their efforts to building a better, healthier society.

This kind of thinking has led business administration programs to devote classes and even full curricula to social and environmental responsibility. More than just a guilty response to the industry's contribution to greenhouse gases, green business has become a race for a solution. As consumers, too, have become increasingly concerned with environmental issues in the past year, businesses devoted to this environmental solution have cropped up, specializing in renewable energy, carbon-credit trading and energy-efficient products.