The unit of study introduces students to quantitatively-aided business analysis and the application of quantitative techniques to inform business decisions. Students will begin to explore a broad range of fundamental techniques and to identify and apply a specific technique to analyse a given business problem. Students will be introduced to the rationale of applying statistics to business decisions. Topics covered also include: probability distributions; normal probability distributions; sampling distributions and parameter estimation; hypothesis testing; linear regression and correlation; time-series analysis and forecasting; index numbers. Students will use MS Excel to conduct statistical analyses. The successful completion of the unit will enable students to begin to visualise the business world from a scientific and quantitative perspective and will equip them to minimise the risk of subjective decision.
The learning and teaching in the unit is designed to be consistent and explicit in assisting students’ transition from their previous educational experience to the nature of learning in higher education and learning in their discipline as part of their lifelong learning.
On successful completion of this unit, students will be able to:
There are no required textbooks for this unit. Recommended readings will be available on VU Collaborate.
This unit is not compulsory for any specific course. Depending on the course you study, this unit may be taken as an elective.