Overview

Does the idea of managing budgets get you excited? Learn how finance and business work together and how you can manage them both.
This generalist Master’s degree is designed for those seeking higher level education and a solid foundation in functional accounting and contemporary finance topics to improve their capability and understanding in the business world.

Broad in its scope, this course is underpinned by practice-led learning to provide an overview of accounting and finance as it is actually applied in the world of business, ideal for those seeking managerial positions or budgetary responsibility. You will learn how financial markets operate and the financial strategies used by successful businesses, drawing on real-life case studies of companies and their financial accounts.

Coventry Business School offers facilities, including one of the largest academic trading floors in Europe, as well as access to industry-standard software for quantitative financial analysis.

Course information

Financial management is a fundamental part of the decision-making, planning and control of any business, organisation, charity or enterprise. Successful management of working capital, selection and control of new capital investment opportunities and long-term financing requires an understanding of the scope and effects of the capital markets for a company and the strategic planning processes necessary to manage the long and short-term financial activities of a firm.

A key advantage of our Master’s degree is the broad base of knowledge covered across both disciplines of accounting and finance. Our modules have been carefully selected to help you understand how global businesses use financial information for decision-making, performance evaluation and financial reporting purposes, providing background knowledge of the external forces that can affect financial performance, such as heightened competition or fluctuating exchange rates.

During your study of financial reporting and interpretation, for example, we will introduce you to relevant accounting concepts and International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), in particular those relevant to group accounting, to provide you with a comprehensive understanding of the content and purpose of published financial statements produced by public limited companies.

While the depth of course content is not sufficient to provide professional accreditation, the quantitative methods we teach are based on the requirements of the main accountancy bodies, encompassing statistical analysis, presentation and spreadsheet manipulation, such as advanced Excel. We will help you develop the skills necessary to critically analyse and interpret financial statements and become aware of their limitations, giving due consideration to the accounting treatment of intangible non-current assets, the problems in attaching monetary values to these and how this impacts on the quality of financial statements.

Why choose this course?

This flexible Master’s degree covers the essential principles and concepts of accounting and financial management and is designed to equip you with a broad and diverse knowledge of the financial theories, management techniques, analytical tools, quantitative and research skills required in an increasingly complex and global business environment.

Coventry Business School is a leading provider of academic and vocational courses in the areas of Economics, Finance and Accounting, not only in the UK but globally. Rated ‘excellent’ by Eduniversal and ranked 5th best in the UK for Economics in the Guardian University Guide 2017, we have excellent relationships with the leading professional bodies in the UK – the Association of International Accountants (AIA), Association of Certified Chartered Accountants (ACCA), the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA) and the Institute of Chartered Accountants England and Wales (ICAEW). We are also active members of the European Foundation for Management Development (EFMD) and Chartered Association of Business Schools (CABS).

Staff teaching on the course include qualified management accountants and experienced academics whose research expertise spans a number of accounting and finance areas, such as the disclosure and transparency of financial information, auditing and financial reporting, stock market efficiency and regulation, stock market investments and financial derivative. All of our accounting and finance courses feature innovative, interactive teaching designed to embed professional skills. You’ll practise trading on our Bloomberg trading floor, which incorporates the best analytical, news and data platforms.

International experience opportunities

Most of our students are international, which provides an opportunity to work in multinational teams during your studies, learning about your fellow students’ cultures and building networks of friends and future business contacts throughout the world.

Career prospects

This Master’s course can act as an important stepping stone for those seeking positions with budget responsibility or senior management roles.

Useful for all types of personal and professional financial management, it can also become the catalyst for some students to pursue careers in financial services as professional accountants, financial analysts and financial consultants, confirming their passion for this field before they commit to study the more intensive professional accounting and finance qualifications.

We work closely with companies across the UK and Europe to offer a wide variety of internships, which previously have included Jaguar Land Rover, KPMG and Penso Consulting, lasting between eight and 12 weeks. These internships provide an opportunity to gain valuable professional experience with past students working on a range of interesting projects on behalf of their organisations, such as investigating the impacts of exchange rate changes in a long-term global gas market model, producing and implementing a financial Strategy to streamline current systems and improve efficiencies and analysing potential income streams and introducing effective payment and income processes.