If you have plans to earn a business administration degree, you can expect to have your pick of lucrative management positions in just about any industry after graduating. Graduates with a degree in business administration qualify for management positions in private businesses, education, government, retail, technology and more. Just a few of the types of positions open to graduates include:

• -Accountant
• -Administrative Services Manager
• -Banker
• -Business Manager
• -City Manager
• -Controller
• -Financial Examiner
• -Human Resources Manager
• -Management Analyst
• -Marketing Manager
• -Project Manager
• -Public Relations Specialists
• -School Administrator

To meet the demands of these positions, a bachelor’s degree is required. To earn more, however, you should consider earning an MBA. Here are the figures:

• -Around 40% of all professionals in business administration related careers have at least a bachelor’s degree
• -More than 25% have a master’s degree
• -Nearly 5% have a doctoral or first professional degree

Many master’s degree holders obtain positions as CEO’s and other high level positions. Business administration professionals with a bachelor’s degree or higher can expect to earn median wages of around $68,050 per year up to $145,600+. 

To get started on a career in business administration, you should enroll in a business administration degree program at an accredited university. The top focus areas are accounting, project management, global management, small business and entrepreneurship or human resource management.

Many professionals in the field obtain a bachelor’s degree through a traditional business administration program at a college, university, business, or trade school. Others may obtain employment as an assistant or other entry-level position in the field while completing their business administration degree online.

Whichever path you decide to take, just make sure the accreditation is by an agency recognized by the U.S. Department of Education. Just a few recognized agencies include:

• -The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB)
• -The Association of Collegiate Business Schools and Programs (ACBSP)
• -Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA)
• -Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges and Schools (ACICS)
• -Distance Education Training Council (DETC)
• -Council on Occupational Education (COE)
• -Accrediting Commission for Career Schools and Colleges of Technology (ACCSCT)

 Regional Accrediting Agencies include:

• -Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools
• -New England Association of Schools and Colleges
• -North Central Association of Colleges and Schools
• -Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities
• -Southern Association of Colleges and Schools
• -Western Association of Schools and Colleges

Accreditation is important, but curriculum is as well. The best programs typically require the same courses, and they offer competitive internship programs as well. The core curriculum at top schools often account for 40% of the degree requirement. Required courses should include:

• -Accounting
• -Analytical Applications
• -Business Computing Skills
• -Business Strategy
• -Corporate Finance
• -Economics
• -Finance
• -Financial Statement Analysis
• -Human Resources
• -Legal & Ethical Environment of Business
• -Management Communication
• -Manufacturing and Production
• -Marketing Management
• -Operations Management
• -Organizational Behavior
• -Principles of Marketing
• -Statistics
• -Strategic Management
• -Technology and Information Systems

Most business administration students continue on to graduate school. The standard course curriculum will prepare you for that. If you’re interested in acceptance into an MBA program, consider earning a Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA), a Bachelor of Science in Business (BSBA), or a Bachelor of Management Studies (BMS).

If you would like more information about business administration careers, visit the Bureau of Labor Statistics at www.bls.gov.

Ah, 2004. U.S. unemployment was a mere 6% and the average home price reached $264,540. 2004 was a time when many people lived well and earned more. Well today, many industries are either down and out, or out altogether, and many cities throughout the U.S. still have high unemployment rates. Silicon Valley is an exception.

Bloomberg reports that Silicon Valley employers rebounded from the recession by adding 12,300 positions in 2010, though the total number of jobs is only back to 2004 levels, according to an annual economic report on the region.

The study, released Februray 14, 2011, by Joint Venture: Silicon Valley Network and Silicon Valley Community Foundation, also found per- capita income stabilized last year, at $62,400 — the same level as in 2005. Meanwhile, the region is still reeling from cutbacks in government jobs and programs, according to the report.

“The good news is the private sector is doing its thing — don’t ask me how they’re doing it, they’re defying gravity,” Russell Hancock, chief executive officer of Joint Venture, a nonprofit group in San Jose, California, said in an interview. “The problem is the public sector is slammed.”

Google Inc., Facebook Inc. and a new crop of social- networking startups are stepping up hiring, helping offset government cuts and the shift of computer-hardware jobs to lower-cost regions. Google is adding 6,000 jobs worldwide this year, and Facebook plans to boost its workforce by 50 percent annually. The social-networking giant will move its headquarters to Menlo Park from nearby Palo Alto to accommodate the growth.

One of the companies adding employees was Apple, Inc. The Cupertino, California-based company increased its workforce by 36 percent California-based to 46,600 as of September 2010. Apple also reported having 2,800 full-time temporary workers and contractors around this time, up from 2,500 in 2009.

Bright, eager—and unwanted. While unemployment is ravaging just about every part of the global workforce, the most enduring harm is being done to young people who can’t grab onto the first rung of the career ladder.

Affected are a range of young people, from high school dropouts, to college grads, to newly minted lawyers and MBAs across the developed world from Britain to Japan. One indication: In the U.S., the unemployment rate for 16- to 24-year-olds has climbed to more than 18%, from 13% a year ago.

For people just starting their careers, the damage may be deep and long-lasting, potentially creating a kind of “lost generation.” Studies suggest that an extended period of youthful joblessness can significantly depress lifetime income as people get stuck in jobs that are beneath their capabilities, or come to be seen by employers as damaged goods.

Equally important, employers are likely to suffer from the scarring of a generation.

This danger of “scarring” seems real, but if you find yourself in this group you have to be proactive and NOT let this hurt you. That may sound easy, as options are now clearly limited. However, on the other hand, the dire condition of the economy can also be used to alter your perceptions of what you need at this time in your life. Many graduates expected to get a high-paying job immediately upon graduation, and now many of those job aren’t available. Yet is that what you really need RIGHT NOW?

In many cases the answer is no. Maybe you can now consider a cool internship that pays little but offers an incredible experience. Perhaps you can take a much-needed break and go on that backpacking trip that you dreamed of doing after college. This of course depends on your funds, though the cost of travel has plummeted.

Alternatively, you can be aggressive about doing something entrepreneurial or contracting out services online.

We know if sucks out there, but you have to make the best of the situation you’re facing. Get motivated, and good things will happen!

It may not feel like it yet in your town or in your industry, but there are indications that things are getting better. After a year or more of hunkering down, it is probably a good time to consider what the recession has done to your business and your industry. At some point, whether now or in a few months, business owners are going to have to switch from playing defense to playing offense.

For many of us, hiring freezes, layoffs, salary reductions and furloughs have helped us survive, but they have probably caused collateral damage to the psyche and bank accounts of our employees. Most of them went along with the program because they understood and because they had few options. But those options are coming. More companies are going to start to hire again. This should mean several things to business owners.

I suspect that many entrepreneurs have figured this out already. You have to be nimble in business, and making quick adjustments is critical to success.

This also bodes well for anyone looking for a job. Circle back to the leads you followed six or even three months ago and see if their situation has changed. You might find opportunities where they didn’t exist before as more companies start to play offense again.

That said, here’s an interesting idea. Many in this country unfortunately believe that we need to restrict immigration to the United States for talented and educated people, as they might take jobs away from Americans. The truth is that we always have a need for more talented people, and these people usually create even more jobs, either by starting businesses or making their employers more competitive.

When the Blue State Obama Administration thinks of small business, it undoubtedly dreams of promising startups churning out solar panels for office buildings or turbine blades for windmills. If its dreams are serious, the Administration should get behind a crackling good idea proposed by entrepreneur Paul Graham. It’s called the Founder Visa, and the idea is to make it easy for the world’s entrepreneurs to come to the U.S. As Paul Kedrosky describes it on the Web site Growthology: “The particulars are still getting worked through, but it has to do with getting a modicum of [private] funding ($250,000) and approval from an independent board that this represents a real startup deal, not some back-room finagling for a visa, and that’s it: You’re in the country and you’re off and running.”

You can never have too many good entrepreneurs. This is a great idea.

Frank Gruber’s workstation at AOL in Dulles could be in any cubicle farm from here to Bangalore — push-pin board for reminders, computer on Formica desk, stifling fluorescent lighting. It’s so drab there’s nothing more to say about it, which is why the odds of finding Gruber there are slim.

Instead, Gruber often works at Tryst in Adams Morgan, at Liberty Tavern in Clarendon, at a Starbucks, in hotel lobbies, at the Library of Congress, on the Bolt Bus to New York or, as he did last week, beside the rooftop pool of the Hilton on Embassy Row. Gruber and Web entrepreneur Jen Consalvo turned up late one morning, opened their Mac laptops, connected to WiFi and began working. A few feet away, the pool’s water shimmered like hand-blown glass.

“I like the breeze,” Consalvo said, working all the while.

Gruber and Consalvo are digital nomads. They work — clad in shorts, T-shirts and sandals — wherever they find a wireless Web connection to reach their colleagues via instant messaging, Twitter, Facebook, e-mail and occasionally by voice on their iPhones or Skype. As digital nomads, experts say, they represent a natural evolution in teleworking. The Internet let millions of wired people work from home; now, with widespread WiFi, many have cut the wires and left home (or the dreary office) to work where they please — and especially around other people, even total strangers.

For nomads, the benefits are both primitive and practical.

Primitive: Tom Folkes, an artificial intelligence programmer, worked last week at the Java Shack in Arlington County because he’s “an extrovert working on introvert tasks. If I’m working at home by myself, I am really hating life. I need people.” He has a coffee shop rotation. “I spread my business around.”

Practical: Marilyn Moysey, an Ezenia employee who sells virtual collaboration software, often works at Panera Bread near her home in Alexandria even though she has an office in the “boondocks.” Why? “Because there is no hope for the road system around here,” she said. Asked where her co-workers were, Moysey said, “I don’t know, because it doesn’t matter anymore.”

Nomad life is already evolving. Nomads who want the feel of working with officemates have begun co-working in public places or at the homes of strangers. They work laptop-by-laptop in living rooms and coffee shops, exchanging both idle chitchat and business advice with people who all work for different companies. The gatherings are called jellies, after a bowl of jelly beans the creators were eating when they came up with the name.

All of this makes sense, including the last part regarding co-working with others. The freedom of working from home, or from any spot you select for that matter, is very rewarding. It’s liberating to break free from the arbitrary work schedule imposed on you by your employer. On the other hand, you learn quickly that some level of self-discipline is critical.

Depending on your personality, however, one can begin to miss the daily interactions with other people. particularly friends at the office. So it’s not too surprising to hear how some decide to congregate and work side-by-side.

This brings up another topic critical for many who decide to work from home when starting a new business. Networking is critical to success, but it can also be important simply from a lifestyle and job satisfaction point of view. Many of us need to get out there, and sometimes it’s too easy to spend day after day at home. It’s not a recipe for success.

Finally, if any of this intrigues you, please check out the 4-Hour Work Week by Tim Ferris. I’ll have much more to say about this in later posts, but Tim is a pioneer in lifestyle management. Check it out if you want to break away from your daily routine of going into an office.

Get travel information at Sundance Vacation.