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Diverse Career Paths for Business Office Management Degree Graduates*

If you’re working toward completing your business office management degree or have recently earned it, you may be wondering: What’s next? In terms of possible career paths, there are a variety of specialty areas to choose from. And the skills you’ve learned can be put to use in a number of ways in each area. Whatever path you follow will be driven largely by your particular interests, skills, and aptitudes, but here are some of the possible industries and job options you may want to consider. For example:

• If you’d like to “get your feet wet” in the business world by working in a general office administration and support role, you might want to start as an executive assistant or an office manager. Well-rounded skills in word processing, spreadsheet management, database management, presentation, and email software, along with your knowledge of organizational behavior, business ethics, problem solving, and decision making, should help to prepare you for the varied responsibilities that those jobs typically entail.
• If you have an affinity for advertising, marketing, or sales, you might consider pursuing a job as an entry-level account executive, marketing specialist, event planner, media buyer, or business writer in a specialty area. Excellent written and oral communication skills, creativity, solid detail orientation, familiarity with print and electronic media (including the Web and e-commerce), and well-developed skills in document processing, presentation creation and delivery, and email and calendar management are typically important in these industries.
• If finance, accounting, or purchasing interest you, you could look for an entry-level job as a financial planner, claims representative, credit analyst, purchasing agent/buyer, bookkeeper/accounting assistant, or even bank officer trainee. In these fields, your expertise in double-entry bookkeeping, the collection, analysis, and reporting of financial data, payroll records management, and computerized accounting software, along with your meticulous attention to detail, should be of great value.
• If a role in human resources or government services is what you’re looking for, you might consider a job as an entry-level employment interviewer, recruiter, or human resources assistant. In these industries, solid training in business law, legal, and compliance considerations, employee safety, ethics, performance and productivity issues and evaluations, problem solving and decision making, and the ability to communicate accurately and effectively with people at all levels may be of importance.
• Of course, if you’ve always wanted to be your own boss, an entrepreneurial venture may be in your plans after graduation. And the diversity of training in computerized systems, accounting, and marketing that is typically offered in a business administration degree program should help to prepare you for the numerous “hats” you’ll wear in managing your own business venture and helping it to grow and prosper.

Apart from any of these career possibilities, future growth in emerging fields and new specialty areas may also heighten the need for professionals like you who have a background in business administration.

With a business office management degree, you are not bound by a narrow scope in terms of the job possibilities. In addition, a business office management degree can provide you with a solid foundation in several fundamental skill areas that may help to prepare you for your pursuit of a higher-level degree, should you be interested in continuing your education. But even without a master’s or doctoral degree, an associate’s or bachelor’s degree in business administration, coupled with on-the-job experience, may help you progress in your career over the long term.