Our elective modules in the Bachelor degree program Business Administration Online

Our bachelor students in the Business Administration Online and Betriebswirtschaft Online degree programs have the opportunity to choose between two elective areas and thus study specializations during their 5th semester: Digital Workplace Learning and Innovation & Entrepreneurship. This article gives an insight into the two elective areas to make it easier for active students and prospective students to choose.

Innovation & Entrepreneurship

The elective module Innovation & Entrepreneurship comprises the Innovation & Entrepreneurship course and the Corporate Entrepreneurship course. This elective module is an in-depth study of the areas of innovation management and entrepreneurship. The primary content is the future-oriented mindset and thus the long-term orientation of companies.

In the Innovation & Entrepreneurship course, our students engage with Corporate Foresight and further develop their Futures Literacy skill. Corporate foresight encompasses a set of practices, skills and abilities of a company that enable companies to recognize discontinuous changes early on, interpret their consequences for the company and determine future courses of action to ensure the long-term survival and success of the company.

In the Corporate Entrepreneurship course, students build on the content of the Entrepreneurship course held in the 4th semester. In this course, the focus is on the entrepreneurship of an existing company. More precisely, it is about the holistic, strategic and visionary view to develop and implement successful business models in companies. In doing so, students must also draw on previously learned content from other courses, such as Strategic Management, Sales Management, Financial Management, Process Management, Human Resources Management and Innovation Management, among others.

Digital Workplace Learning

The Digital Workplace Learning elective module consists of the courses Digital Workplace Learning as well as Knowledge Management. In these two courses, we place special emphasis on learning and knowledge management in companies and how these two aspects are implemented in practice.

In the Digital Workplace Learning course, the focus is on how current trends affect work and learning in the workplace. These can be long-lasting and constantly advancing trends, for example, the digital transformation, globalization or the increased use of robots; but, they can also be disruptions, such as the Corona pandemic and the resulting increasing trend of home office. All these influences change workplace learning itself and its requirements; changes, which companies have to meet. Another big aspect is the development of a learning culture, i.e. the circumstances that must prevail for workplace learning to be successful. There are factors that can have a very positive influence on a learning culture, such as trust, autonomy, but also technology. How these factors can be improved and how this can lead to a positive learning culture is what we will deal with in this course.

The course Knowledge Management deals with the central questions of what knowledge actually is and what role it plays as a resource in a company (and also for the individual). This perspective on knowledge as a resource raises the question of how this resource can be handled, how knowledge can be transferred, stored or saved, i.e. how it is "manageable". To this end, we will examine the essential tools of practical knowledge management to find out how they can be used in both individual and corporate settings and what results can realistically be achieved through their use.

Although the content of the elective modules is completely different, they have one thing in common: Both elective modules are held in English and the degree programs "Business Administration Online" and "Betriebswirtschaft Online" are combined for these courses. This gives the students of both degree programs the opportunity to expand their network and engage in further exciting discussions.