BCom (Management Sciences)

Admission requirements

   About the programme

The BCom (Management Sciences) is the degree programme for students who wish to pursue a career in management. 

The programme offers you broad and open-ended choices of modules. Within this programme, it is also possible to focus on a specific study area, known as a focal area. The objective of focal areas is to help you with a career focus as the focal area will largely determine your eventual career.

   Programme content

The BCom (Management Sciences) programme has the broadest module combination of all the Faculty's programmes. Therefore, the programme provides a wide variety of focal areas, of which Financial Planning and Investment Management open up the opportunity for professional registration.

To help students with a specific career focus, we suggest certain module combinations, making up a specific career focus. You choose your focal area in your second year when you have become more familiar with the management fields of study. For the curricula of the broad programme and its focal areas, see the Faculty's Calendar, page 30.   

   Career opportunities for various focal areas

The subject combination or focal area you choose will largely determine the kinds of jobs available to you. See below for the programme's focal areas and the different lines of work for which they prepare you. 

Agricultural Economics

Agricultural Economics is an interdisciplinary field where you can study the application of economic and management sciences to the production and marketing of agricultural and food products. A BCom (Management Sciences) qualification with the focal area Agricultural Economics gives you access to professional occupations in the growing domestic and international agricultural and food industries.

Professional occupations include general management, financial management and logistical management in the entire food value chain, from agricultural input delivery, financial services, agribusinesses involved in production, distribution and marketing to food processing and production businesses.

Business Analytics

Study in this focal area will equip you with a combination of management and analytical capabilities to be highly competitive in the business world. The aim is to educate managers and analysts who can provide insight from data and manage business functions and processes strategically, tactically and operationally. They will be able to make decisions quantitatively to help maximise the firm’s wealth.

Entrepreneurship and Innovation Management

This focal area helps to turn you towards establishing your own business in the future rather than striving to achieve so-called work security in the form of a fixed appointment. The second and third years cover four important themes:

• introduction to entrepreneurship
• small business management
• creativity and innovation management
• strategic and corporate entrepreneurship

Financial Management

This focal area deals with three important questions which determine the ultimate success of any business:

• Where do we get money to fund the business?
• How do we use the money?
• How do we apportion the profits?

The 'health' of the business is then measured using financial ratios. Thorough knowledge of financial management is crucial for business success, whether you are considering starting your own business or working for an established company. With this expertise, you could consider a career as a financial director, financial advisor or financial analyst. 

Financial Planning

The focal area Financial Planning enables you to enrol for the Postgraduate Diploma in Financial Planning after obtaining the BCom (Management Sciences) degree. If you complete the postgraduate diploma successfully, you may write the entrance examination for the CFP® (Certified Financial Planner®) designation, which is internationally recognised. Find more information on the CFP® designation here. For information on the Postgraduate Diploma in Financial Planning, see our Calendar, page 96.

This practice-oriented focal area equips you for the profession of financial advisor in your own business, banking, insurance or other related businesses.

Human Resource Management

The human resource function is responsible for acquiring, developing and maintaining a competent and engaged workforce and managing labour relations effectively. An organisation’s success depends on its workforce quality and how that workforce is utilised and managed. That is why human resource management is so important. This focal area prepares you to address people-related opportunities and risks in a way that will make you a strategic business partner in the organisation you serve.

Industrial Psychology is a compulsory subject from the first year.

Information Systems Management

Increasingly, knowledge is becoming the deciding factor in advanced economic activities around the world, spurred largely by the rapid progress in computational power. For organisations today, information is primarily computer-processed expressions of knowledge that facilitates productive work. But because organisations are complex phenomena and because of the complicated nature of computer technology and the information systems they support, the management of information poses difficult but also fascinating challenges. See here for more information.

Investment Management

The focal area Investment Management bases its subject combination on the curriculum of the international Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA), one of the most sought-after qualifications in the investment industry worldwide. The CFA is a qualification focused on portfolio management and investment analysis (shares, bonds, derivative instruments and real estate).

After completing the BCom (Management Sciences) with the focal area Investment Management, you will be eligible to study successfully for Level 1 of the examination for the international Chartered Financial Analyst® (CFA®) qualification.

You may also apply for BCom Honours studies covering Level 2 and 3 of the international CFA examinations' learning outcomes. Complete information on the CFA programme is available here (click on “Programs” > “CFA program”).

Logistics and Supply Chain Management

This focal area prepares you for a wide variety of challenging logistics and supply chain job opportunities worldwide in the public sector and private businesses. From the largest vehicle manufacturing company to the smallest producer and any business buying or selling products – they all require people with logistics and supply chain skills. Such people can plan, organise and control logistics and supply chain activities, both locally and internationally. Service organisations (for example, hospitals and restaurants) also utilise logistics and supply chain management to make sure that they can serve their clients properly.

Marketing Management

The Marketing Management focal area and its instruction cover the following:

• marketing theory
• consumer behaviour
• applying theory to various aspects of marketing, with special emphasis on retail, services, promotion and marketing research
• the development of a management orientation in approaching marketing challenges

?The focal area is continuously adapted to keep up with modern technologies such as the internet’s impact and its advantages for marketing. A variety of modules in other areas form part of the compulsory modules or are available as electives.

Career opportunities include marketing manager, advertising manager, promotions manager, brand manager and marketing researcher. 

Public and Development Management

Like many other developing countries, South Africa faces complex developmental and public policy challenges. These demand collaborative action by the public, business and voluntary sectors, along with broader civil society at local, provincial, national and global levels. These complexities include social, economic, environmental developmental and public policy challenges; for example, poverty, unemployment, inequality, the climate emergency, and the perils and possibilities associated with the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Public and Development Management provides exposure and insight into these challenges, specifically in southern developing countries. It helps future practitioners develop embodied policy responses and manage such responses effectively, efficiently and equitably.

Public and Development Management is a compulsory subject from the first year. 

Admission requirements

   About the programme

The BCom (Management Sciences) is the degree programme for students who wish to pursue a career in management. 

The programme offers you broad and open-ended choices of modules. Within this programme, it is also possible to focus on a specific study area, known as a focal area. The objective of focal areas is to help you with a career focus as the focal area will largely determine your eventual career.

   Programme content

The BCom (Management Sciences) programme has the broadest module combination of all the Faculty's programmes. Therefore, the programme provides a wide variety of focal areas, of which Financial Planning and Investment Management open up the opportunity for professional registration.

To help students with a specific career focus, we suggest certain module combinations, making up a specific career focus. You choose your focal area in your second year when you have become more familiar with the management fields of study. For the curricula of the broad programme and its focal areas, see the Faculty's Calendar, page 30.   

   Career opportunities for various focal areas

The subject combination or focal area you choose will largely determine the kinds of jobs available to you. See below for the programme's focal areas and the different lines of work for which they prepare you. 

Agricultural Economics

Agricultural Economics is an interdisciplinary field where you can study the application of economic and management sciences to the production and marketing of agricultural and food products. A BCom (Management Sciences) qualification with the focal area Agricultural Economics gives you access to professional occupations in the growing domestic and international agricultural and food industries.

Professional occupations include general management, financial management and logistical management in the entire food value chain, from agricultural input delivery, financial services, agribusinesses involved in production, distribution and marketing to food processing and production businesses.

Business Analytics

Study in this focal area will equip you with a combination of management and analytical capabilities to be highly competitive in the business world. The aim is to educate managers and analysts who can provide insight from data and manage business functions and processes strategically, tactically and operationally. They will be able to make decisions quantitatively to help maximise the firm’s wealth.

Entrepreneurship and Innovation Management

This focal area helps to turn you towards establishing your own business in the future rather than striving to achieve so-called work security in the form of a fixed appointment. The second and third years cover four important themes:

• introduction to entrepreneurship
• small business management
• creativity and innovation management
• strategic and corporate entrepreneurship

Financial Management

This focal area deals with three important questions which determine the ultimate success of any business:

• Where do we get money to fund the business?
• How do we use the money?
• How do we apportion the profits?

The 'health' of the business is then measured using financial ratios. Thorough knowledge of financial management is crucial for business success, whether you are considering starting your own business or working for an established company. With this expertise, you could consider a career as a financial director, financial advisor or financial analyst. 

Financial Planning

The focal area Financial Planning enables you to enrol for the Postgraduate Diploma in Financial Planning after obtaining the BCom (Management Sciences) degree. If you complete the postgraduate diploma successfully, you may write the entrance examination for the CFP® (Certified Financial Planner®) designation, which is internationally recognised. Find more information on the CFP® designation here. For information on the Postgraduate Diploma in Financial Planning, see our Calendar, page 96.

This practice-oriented focal area equips you for the profession of financial advisor in your own business, banking, insurance or other related businesses.

Human Resource Management

The human resource function is responsible for acquiring, developing and maintaining a competent and engaged workforce and managing labour relations effectively. An organisation’s success depends on its workforce quality and how that workforce is utilised and managed. That is why human resource management is so important. This focal area prepares you to address people-related opportunities and risks in a way that will make you a strategic business partner in the organisation you serve.

Industrial Psychology is a compulsory subject from the first year.

Information Systems Management

Increasingly, knowledge is becoming the deciding factor in advanced economic activities around the world, spurred largely by the rapid progress in computational power. For organisations today, information is primarily computer-processed expressions of knowledge that facilitates productive work. But because organisations are complex phenomena and because of the complicated nature of computer technology and the information systems they support, the management of information poses difficult but also fascinating challenges. See here for more information.

Investment Management

The focal area Investment Management bases its subject combination on the curriculum of the international Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA), one of the most sought-after qualifications in the investment industry worldwide. The CFA is a qualification focused on portfolio management and investment analysis (shares, bonds, derivative instruments and real estate).

After completing the BCom (Management Sciences) with the focal area Investment Management, you will be eligible to study successfully for Level 1 of the examination for the international Chartered Financial Analyst® (CFA®) qualification.

You may also apply for BCom Honours studies covering Level 2 and 3 of the international CFA examinations' learning outcomes. Complete information on the CFA programme is available here (click on “Programs” > “CFA program”).

Logistics and Supply Chain Management

This focal area prepares you for a wide variety of challenging logistics and supply chain job opportunities worldwide in the public sector and private businesses. From the largest vehicle manufacturing company to the smallest producer and any business buying or selling products – they all require people with logistics and supply chain skills. Such people can plan, organise and control logistics and supply chain activities, both locally and internationally. Service organisations (for example, hospitals and restaurants) also utilise logistics and supply chain management to make sure that they can serve their clients properly.

Marketing Management

The Marketing Management focal area and its instruction cover the following:

• marketing theory
• consumer behaviour
• applying theory to various aspects of marketing, with special emphasis on retail, services, promotion and marketing research
• the development of a management orientation in approaching marketing challenges

?The focal area is continuously adapted to keep up with modern technologies such as the internet’s impact and its advantages for marketing. A variety of modules in other areas form part of the compulsory modules or are available as electives.

Career opportunities include marketing manager, advertising manager, promotions manager, brand manager and marketing researcher. 

Public and Development Management

Like many other developing countries, South Africa faces complex developmental and public policy challenges. These demand collaborative action by the public, business and voluntary sectors, along with broader civil society at local, provincial, national and global levels. These complexities include social, economic, environmental developmental and public policy challenges; for example, poverty, unemployment, inequality, the climate emergency, and the perils and possibilities associated with the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Public and Development Management provides exposure and insight into these challenges, specifically in southern developing countries. It helps future practitioners develop embodied policy responses and manage such responses effectively, efficiently and equitably.

Public and Development Management is a compulsory subject from the first year.