Topic: Business activity and influences on business

Skills:

• Be aware of the distinction between financial and non-financial objectives.
• Examine how a business has grown over time and how its objectives could have changed during that time.
• Be able to recognise what is meant by each type of business and be able to recognise the most appropriate business type to a given business situation.
• Be able to identify which sectors of the economy a sole trader, partnership and company they are part of.
• Be able to consider the importance of a range of factors that determine the location of a business.
• Think about the fact that markets for goods and services are now interdependent and that students cannot consider competition from just coming from other domestic producers.
• Know that a weakening currency will make exports from that country cheaper in terms of a different nation’s currency which will lead to an increase in demand.
• Know that success can be measured using a variety of different measures.

Topic: People in Business

Skills:

• Understand the different forms of communication.
• Understand the benefits and drawbacks of using IT to facilitate communication.
• Understand the difference between full-time and part-time employment.
• Know what the process of employing a worker is.
• Know what the legal controls are trying to do.
• Understand that some training may be required so that employees do not break the law.
• Understand why a business will ultimately benefit from having a motivated workforce.
• Know the difference between financial methods of motivating workers and non-financial methods of motivating workers.
• Should have a simple recognition of the different functional areas of a business.

Topic: Business Finance

Skills:

• Consider the financial constraints a business faces as it starts up and expands in size.
• Be able to match the appropriate source of finance with the situation the business faces.
• Know the advantages and disadvantages of using internal sources of finance.
• Recognise that cash and profit are related, but not identical concepts.
• Be able interpret cash flow figures and tables to explain what is happening, or to evaluate the cash flow position of the business.
• Be able to perform basic business calculations and be able to interpret a break-even diagram.
• May be asked to calculate, cost of sales, gross profit, other operating expenses and operating profit.
• Be able to decide whether the business is successful and whether there is any risk of failure following the analysis of the accounts of the business.

Topic: Marketing

Skills:

• Explore sample size but are not expected to look at sampling techniques.
• Know the difference between product orientation and market orientation.
• Know the difference between niche marketing and mass marketing.
• Understand that there is a difference between goods (tangible product) and a service.
• Know what the Boston Matrix is.
• Know that cost plus pricing involves adding a percentage mark-up on to the average total cost of the product.
• Know what viral advertising is.

Topic: Business Operations

Skills:

• Know the various factors that cause economies and diseconomies of scale to occur.
• Know the advantages and disadvantages of job, batch and flow production and the scenarios where certain production processes would apply.
• Know what Kaizen (continuous improvement) is.
• Know what the four factors of production are and the distinction between capital and labour intensive production.
• Know the three factors of production: Enterprise (Entrepreneurship), Capital (machinery), Land (to include raw materials) and Labour (workers).