Business Analytics Wave Sweeps Across B-Schools

Innovation in business is about filling a need, solving a problem, narrowing a gap — or completely closing it. No one who has been paying attention these last few years will be surprised to learn that the field of business analytics is a sizzling hot topic in business schools, with new courses, concentrations, and even full-on majors springing up everywhere you turn. From new business analytics majors bursting on the scene at Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business and Drexel University’s LeBow College of Business to Santa Clara University’s new BA minor in the Leavey School of Business and Babson College’s new BA concentration, it’s truly one of the 4 Key Trends Happening Now in Biz Ed. (See our series on specialized master’s degree business analytics programs by clicking here.)

One of the latest schools to hop on this fast-moving train is Notre Dame’s Mendoza College of Business. In the fall of 2017, Mendoza introduced business analytics to its lineup of majors, the first time the school had undertaken the task of creating a new undergraduate major in about 35 years, says Rob Easley, chair of Mendoza’s IT, Analytics, and Operations Department and a key player in designing and launching the new degree.

“It looks more sudden than it was, but the reality is, we took over a two- or three-year period before doing this,” Easley tells Poets&Quants for Undergrads. The school spent those years consulting alumni, various boards of advisers, and actual firms. “We talked to them about the growth in analytics that was predicted,” Easley says. “They all agreed it would be a big thing. We also read other sources like reports put out by McKinsey. Everyone was talking about how big it would be.”

Read the entire story: Business Analytics Wave Sweeps Across B-Schools