What Can I Do with a Bachelor’s in Finance Degree?

If you like to think about num­bers or find the finan­cial mar­kets and invest­ment vehi­cles such as bonds and stocks intrigu­ing, you might want to con­sid­er major­ing in finance. A finance major is a pro­fes­sion­al­ly-ori­ent­ed move. Major­ing in the art and sci­ence of man­ag­ing mon­ey, as finance is com­mon­ly defined, presents you with an oppor­tu­ni­ty to learn about finan­cial mar­kets, var­i­ous busi­ness mod­els, and build new skills at the same time. You can pur­sue a bachelor’s in finance degree online or a tra­di­tion­al on-cam­pus finance pro­gram depend­ing on which option works best for you. It’s a per­fect prepa­ra­tion for a master’s degree as well,

A finance major may be the right option for you if you are a work­ing pro­fes­sion­al look­ing to access more oppor­tu­ni­ties or change careers, or a high school stu­dent choos­ing an under­grad­u­ate degree. But, what is a finance major, and what can you do with a degree in finance? Well, a lot. Career-wise, there are so many oppor­tu­ni­ties for finance majors. Some of the most com­mon fields for finance majors are risk man­age­ment, cor­po­rate finance, invest­ment man­age­ment, man­age­ment con­sult­ing, invest­ment bank­ing, and more. As you can see, there are a lot of career options for finance majors out there.

What do finance majors do? With a finance major, you will learn all the var­i­ous aspects of lim­it­ing or ana­lyz­ing expens­es, how to make key invest­ment deci­sions, and finan­cial plan­ning. As an employ­ee, you will be help­ing the com­pa­ny plan on how to main­tain prof­itabil­i­ty or grow rev­enue both in the long term and the short term. You will be using num­bers-dri­ven approach­es to solv­ing prob­lems in cre­ative ways. With a bachelor’s degree in finance, you can become a per­son­al finan­cial advis­er, finan­cial man­ag­er, finan­cial ana­lyst, finan­cial exam­in­er, etc. A finance degree salary out of col­lege can be quite reward­ing, too. The choice is yours.

Relat­ed:

• Best Bachelor’s in Finance Degree Programs
• Best Online Finance Degree Programs
• Most Afford­able Online Finance Degree Programs
• Fastest Online Finance Degree Programs

What Can I Do with a Finance Degree?

Are you won­der­ing what to do with a finance degree? What do finance majors do? Finance majors have a lot of career oppor­tu­ni­ties for finance majors to pur­sue in a mul­ti­tude of finan­cial ser­vices indus­tries after they earn their degree. But before that, you have to choose a college/university where you can earn a bachelor’s degree in finance, which can be an over­whelm­ing process. There are plen­ty of fac­tors to con­sid­er with accred­i­ta­tion being of utmost impor­tance. After choos­ing a col­lege, care­ful­ly con­sid­er the type of finance degree you want to pur­sue (as there are mul­ti­ple options) and whether you want to earn your degree online, on-cam­pus, or some sort of a com­bi­na­tion of both.

What can you do with a finance degree? A bachelor’s degree in finance will open the door to diverse career paths and a vari­ety of oppor­tu­ni­ties. But earn­ing a bachelor’s degree in finance alone will not be enough to secure employ­ment – you will need to get var­i­ous cer­ti­fi­ca­tions to increase the chances of secur­ing a high finance degree salary out of col­lege. There are sev­er­al finance pro­fes­sion­al cer­ti­fi­ca­tions to con­sid­er (to be dis­cussed in detail lat­er in the arti­cle). So if you want to know ”What can I do with a degree in finance?” learn more about what to expect as a finance major, includ­ing employ­a­bil­i­ty, entry-lev­el career oppor­tu­ni­ties, and salary.

Business School Accreditation

Region­al or nation­al accred­i­ta­tion is intend­ed to assure the stu­dent that a col­lege or uni­ver­si­ty adheres to the high­est stan­dards of qual­i­ty based on pro­fes­sion­al prac­tice and lat­est research. Whether it’s a tra­di­tion­al degree or a finance degree online, an insti­tu­tion of high­er learn­ing is expect­ed to con­tin­ue demon­strat­ing growth and devel­op­ment. It shouldn’t just main­tain exist­ing stan­dards but con­tin­u­al­ly improve through reg­u­lar review cycles after get­ting accred­i­ta­tion. Stu­dents, edu­ca­tors, and employ­ers world­wide rec­og­nize accred­i­ta­tion as a sym­bol of excel­lence in the edu­ca­tion sector.

This vol­un­tary, non-gov­ern­men­tal val­i­da­tion process is used to eval­u­ate insti­tu­tions of high­er learn­ing such as uni­ver­si­ties and col­leges. Accred­i­ta­tion is used to test the effec­tive­ness of an institution’s aca­d­e­m­ic pro­grams. The best under­grad­u­ate schools for finance majors have accred­i­ta­tion from var­i­ous region­al and nation­al accred­i­ta­tion bod­ies. There are many types of busi­ness school accred­i­ta­tion, so don’t be con­fused if you notice that your col­lege or uni­ver­si­ty of choice is accred­it­ed by mul­ti­ple orga­ni­za­tions. Com­mon busi­ness school accred­i­ta­tion bod­ies include:

ACBSP Accreditation

Estab­lished in 1992, the Accred­i­ta­tion Coun­cil for Busi­ness Schools and Pro­grams (ACBSP) is one of the most rec­og­nized busi­ness school accred­i­ta­tion bod­ies in the world. Their goal is to reward excel­lence in edu­ca­tion. The ACBSP embraces a more inter­na­tion­al col­lec­tion of insti­tu­tions of high­er learn­ing and is head­quar­tered in both Bel­gium and the Unit­ed States. This orga­ni­za­tion was the first to offer busi­ness accred­i­ta­tion at asso­ciate, bac­calau­re­ate, mas­ter, and doc­tor­al degree levels.

ACBSP accred­i­ta­tion focus­es on teach­ing excel­lence and stu­dent out­comes. The ACBSP gives accred­i­ta­tion for busi­ness-relat­ed and account­ing pro­grams and is rec­og­nized by the Coun­cil for High­er Edu­ca­tion Accred­i­ta­tion (CHEA). The accred­i­ta­tion body rec­og­nizes the sig­nif­i­cance of schol­ar­ly research and encour­ages a bal­ance between teach­ing and research. ACBSP accred­it­ed schools are some of the high­est-ranked in the world. There are ACBSP accred­it­ed online schools too for those wish­ing to pur­sue their finance degree online.

AACSB Accreditation

Orga­nized in 1916, the Asso­ci­a­tion to Advance Col­le­giate Schools of Busi­ness (AACSB) is an inter­na­tion­al­ly rec­og­nized busi­ness school accred­i­ta­tion body. AACSB mem­bers offer account­ing and busi­ness at all lev­els. AACSB rep­re­sents only the high­est stan­dards of achieve­ment vis-à-vis busi­ness schools in the world, mean­ing that their accred­i­ta­tion is unsur­passed. AACSB accred­i­ta­tion is one of the most dif­fi­cult to acquire for busi­ness schools across the world. Only less than 5% of the over 13,000 busi­ness schools apply­ing to be accred­it­ed by the AACSB have the accreditation.

Busi­ness schools apply­ing for AACSB accred­i­ta­tion are put through a rig­or­ous process of peer reviews and self-eval­u­a­tion. The process starts with the school sub­mit­ting an appli­ca­tion and wait­ing for the orga­ni­za­tion to approve the approval, after which the body’s require­ments are eval­u­at­ed and if the stan­dards are met, accred­i­ta­tion is grant­ed. Uni­ver­si­ties and col­leges with AACSB accred­i­ta­tion have out­stand­ing, unri­valed career oppor­tu­ni­ties for finance majors and include the best of every­thing. Choose one of the many AACSB accred­it­ed online schools when look­ing for an online bach­e­lors in finance degree program.

ACBSP and AACSB are the most rec­og­nized busi­ness school accred­i­ta­tion bod­ies; the best under­grad­u­ate schools for finance majors will usu­al­ly be accred­it­ed by one or the oth­er. The dif­fer­ence between the ACBSP and the AACSB is that the for­mer focus­es on the qual­i­ty of the fac­ul­ty and those of who are teach­ing the busi­ness cours­es (not so much research) while the lat­ter focus­es on research and the institution’s com­mit­ment for the use of high-lev­el research to deliv­er high-qual­i­ty edu­ca­tion. Anoth­er notable busi­ness school accred­i­ta­tion body is the Inter­na­tion­al Assem­bly for Col­le­giate Busi­ness Edu­ca­tion (IACBE). IACBE accred­its uni­ver­si­ties and col­leges that only offer asso­ciate degree pro­grams in busi­ness and was found­ed in 1997.

Types of Finance Degrees

Stu­dents look­ing to work with invest­ments and bud­gets for a com­pa­ny or for indi­vid­ual clients can pur­sue a finance degree. As stat­ed ear­li­er in the arti­cle, there are many types of finance degrees. What does a degree in finance do? If you find the stock mar­kets inter­est­ing and you’d like to make invest­ment pre­dic­tions, have strict atten­tion to detail, or enjoy solv­ing prob­lems, you can major in finance. But why major in finance and not in oth­er sim­i­lar options such as account­ing? What is a finance major any­way? What do you learn with a finance degree? Keep read­ing to learn more about finance degrees.

Typ­i­cal­ly, a finance major is offered as a bachelor’s degree in finance. A finance major can also be offered as a spe­cial­iza­tion with­in a busi­ness admin­is­tra­tion pro­gram. Major­ing in finance pre­pares you to work in this lucra­tive field. When it comes to giv­ing stu­dents a high earn­ing poten­tial and great employ­ment prospects, the best finance degrees are a sol­id prepa­ra­tion. Those with a finance major qual­i­fy for a vast range of oppor­tu­ni­ties in pub­lic and pri­vate orga­ni­za­tions as well as non-profits.

Bachelor of Business Administration (Finance Concentration) or Bachelor of Finance

What are the com­mon types of finance degrees? There are sev­er­al ways to major in finance, and earn­ing a Bach­e­lor of Busi­ness Admin­is­tra­tion (BBA) with a finance con­cen­tra­tion or Bach­e­lor of Finance degree is one of them. Finance degree cours­es will be rough­ly the same in either, but a BBA will have more of a man­age­r­i­al empha­sis, while the Bach­e­lor of Finance will focus more on the numbers.

Stu­dents prepar­ing for employ­ment oppor­tu­ni­ties in entry-lev­el finance jobs imme­di­ate­ly after grad­u­at­ing as well as those look­ing for a career change by mov­ing to the finan­cial sec­tor should pur­sue a bach­e­lor of finance degree; it’s the best option for them. A bachelor’s degree in finance helps stu­dents devel­op skills and com­pe­ten­cies required in today’s com­plex busi­ness world. The finance degree cours­es in a Bach­e­lor of Finance will be rig­or­ous and tech­ni­cal, so be ready for math and statistics.

What is a finance major, and what do you learn in the pro­gram? The best finance degrees help stu­dents under­stand the inner work­ings of com­plex finan­cial sys­tems, mas­ter analy­sis and invest­ment prac­tices, and gain knowl­edge of finan­cial man­age­ment tools. The finance degree cours­es in a BBA in Finance or Bach­e­lor of Finance help stu­dents build foun­da­tion­al skills essen­tial in the finan­cial sec­tor. You can earn a BBA in Finance or Bach­e­lor of Finance online or on-cam­pus, depend­ing on your cir­cum­stances. If you’re a work­ing pro­fes­sion­al with oth­er com­mit­ments, you will find earn­ing a finance degree online to be the more con­ve­nient option.

Associate Degree in Finance

Earn­ing an asso­ciate degree in finance or busi­ness admin­is­tra­tion is a great option for those look­ing for an oppor­tu­ni­ty to major in finance. This type of finance degree pro­gram includes sev­er­al intro­duc­to­ry cours­es in finan­cial man­age­ment. Com­mon finance degree cours­es in the asso­ciate finance degree pro­gram are Prin­ci­ples of Account­ing, Micro­eco­nom­ics, and Macro­eco­nom­ics. The best finance degrees at the associate’s lev­el can be a great intro­duc­tion to fun­da­men­tals knowl­edge and skills nec­es­sary for entry-lev­el employ­ment oppor­tu­ni­ties in the finan­cial sec­tor. Note that only a hand­ful of insti­tu­tions offer asso­ciate degrees in finance.

Finance Degree Requirements: What Do Finance Majors Do in Class?

Stu­dents look­ing to enroll for a bachelor’s degree in finance need to make sure that they’ve met all the require­ments. In most cas­es, finance degree require­ments at the under­grad­u­ate lev­el include a strong col­lege prepara­to­ry high school edu­ca­tion. Sub­jects such as account­ing, math, com­mu­ni­ca­tion, speech, and Eng­lish are vital. Finance is a field heavy on math­e­mat­ics and sta­tis­tics, so the best under­grad­u­ate schools for finance majors will expect a strong back­ground in math. Finance degree cours­es will put a real empha­sis on num­bers, obviously.

The best under­grad­u­ate schools for finance majors will also put an empha­sis on tech­nol­o­gy; com­put­ing pow­er dri­ves mod­ern finance. Com­put­er skills are impor­tant for qual­i­fi­ca­tion for the best finance degrees in the coun­try. There­fore, stu­dents hop­ing to major in finance should enroll for com­put­er tech­nol­o­gy class­es in high school if avail­able. Finance degree cours­es in the tech­nol­o­gy used for finance will expect a strong foun­da­tion in com­put­er usage, but not nec­es­sar­i­ly pro­gram­ming. Col­lege admis­sions are big on lead­er­ship skills, stu­dents can vol­un­teer in com­mu­ni­ty pro­grams or join var­i­ous clubs that cul­ti­vate such.

Finance Professional Certifications

A lot of career oppor­tu­ni­ties for finance majors involve the prac­tice of allo­cat­ing mon­e­tary resources and mak­ing finan­cial deci­sions. Even the best finance degrees may not be enough to dis­tin­guish your­self. So beyond the degree itself, what do finance majors do to prove they can han­dle the job? Those look­ing for career oppor­tu­ni­ties in the finan­cial sec­tor can seek cer­ti­fi­ca­tion at the grad­u­ate and bac­calau­re­ate level.

Account­ing and finance cer­ti­fi­ca­tions arm the stu­dent with the knowl­edge and back­ground required to build a career in dif­fer­ent fields of finance. There are many types of finance cer­ti­fi­ca­tions depend­ing on your career choice. Note that stu­dents can earn cor­po­rate finance cer­ti­fi­ca­tions online by enrolling for online cours­es. Some of the best finance cer­ti­fi­ca­tions include:

Financial Risk Manager (FRM) Certification

Finance majors pur­su­ing careers in risk man­age­ment posi­tions such as risk ana­lysts and risk offi­cers can improve their chances of secur­ing employ­ment by get­ting Finan­cial Risk Man­ag­er (FRM) Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion. FRM is a niche and a tar­get­ed cer­ti­fi­ca­tion for those look­ing for spe­cif­ic careers in risk man­age­ment. The pass rate for FRM cer­ti­fi­ca­tion is rough­ly 50 per­cent and takes about a year to complete.

Certified Financial Planner (CFP) Certification

Those look­ing at careers in wealth and invest­ment man­age­ment stand to reap a lot of ben­e­fits from earn­ing a Cer­ti­fied Finan­cial Plan­ner (CFP) Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion. This is one of the best finance cer­ti­fi­ca­tions. CFP focus­es on high net worth or retail seg­ment of invest­ment man­age­ment, finan­cial plan­ning. CFP cer­ti­fi­ca­tion is a good dif­fer­en­tia­tor and offers great val­ue for wealth man­age­ment, pri­vate bank­ing, and retail banking.

Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst (CAIA) Designation

The Char­tered Alter­na­tive Invest­ment Ana­lyst (CAIA) des­ig­na­tion is a great option for those look­ing at var­i­ous career paths in niche areas of finance such as hedge fund and asset man­age­ment. The pass rate for CAIA is about 70%. CAIA is a top finance cer­ti­fi­ca­tion cov­er­ing top­ics such as risk man­age­ment, asset allo­ca­tion, struc­tured prod­ucts, real assets, pri­vate equi­ty, hedge funds, and ethics. On aver­age, CAIA takes about 12–18 months to complete.

Certified Public Accountant (CPA) Certification

When it comes to account­ing and finance cer­ti­fi­ca­tions, the Cer­ti­fied Pub­lic Accoun­tant (CPA) Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion is one of the most pop­u­lar options. A CPA cer­ti­fi­ca­tion plays real­ly well in a finance career path and is the gold stan­dard in the account­ing world. CPA’s focus on cor­po­rate finance is minor but those who’d want to have a CFO’s job at some point in their career should con­sid­er get­ting a CPA certification.

Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) Certification

Char­tered Finan­cial Ana­lyst (CFA) cer­ti­fi­ca­tion is con­sid­ered one of the best finance cer­ti­fi­ca­tions in the world. CFA main­ly focus­es on invest­ment analy­sis and port­fo­lio man­age­ment. The CFA cer­ti­fi­ca­tion has 3 lev­els, which take about four years to com­plete. The com­ple­tion of this cer­ti­fi­ca­tion demon­strates a sol­id work eth­ic and a high lev­el of intel­li­gence – one of the best ways for recruiters to pick out the best employees.

Chartered Investment Counsellor (CIC) Certification

A Char­tered Invest­ment Coun­sel­lor (CIC) Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion is designed for those work­ing in invest­ment coun­sel­ing and port­fo­lio man­age­ment. This des­ig­na­tion is seen as a sub­set of the Char­tered Finan­cial Ana­lyst (CFA) cer­ti­fi­ca­tion but is more spe­cif­ic. One needs to have at least five years of expe­ri­ence work­ing at an Invest­ment Advis­er Asso­ci­a­tion mem­ber to be eli­gi­ble for a CIC certification.

So are account­ing and finance cer­ti­fi­ca­tions nec­es­sary? No, but they def­i­nite­ly have a ben­e­fit in giv­ing a new grad­u­ate or young pro­fes­sion­al more author­i­ty. What does a degree in finance do with­out a cer­ti­fi­ca­tion? It still helps you get a job in finance, but every­one can use a lit­tle help.

Careers in Finance: What Jobs Can You Get with a Finance Degree?

Once they have the degree and cer­ti­fi­ca­tions, what do finance majors do to find jobs? What can you do with a degree in finance? There are numer­ous careers with a finance major’s degree in the finan­cial sec­tor and oth­er indus­tries, espe­cial­ly with the best finance degrees. Finance major careers require indi­vid­u­als who can eval­u­ate the qual­i­ta­tive and quan­ti­ta­tive dimen­sions of an entity’s prob­lems and assess the finan­cial impli­ca­tions of indi­vid­ual and cor­po­rate actions. These pro­fes­sion­als have the ana­lyt­i­cal skills to appraise the finan­cial stand­ing of a busi­ness by dis­sect­ing its finan­cial statements.

What do you do with a finance degree? The most pop­u­lar jobs for finance majors are in fields such as risk man­age­ment, cor­po­rate finance, invest­ment man­age­ment, man­age­ment con­sult­ing, real estate, com­mer­cial bank­ing, insur­ance com­pa­nies, and invest­ment bank­ing – only to name a few. These are where you’ll see the best finance degree salary out of col­lege. You won’t be a chief finan­cial offi­cer, but entry-lev­el posi­tions in finan­cial analy­sis are high-pay­ing. The most com­mon types of finance jobs include:

Budget Analysts

Finance majors have the ana­lyt­i­cal and com­mu­ni­ca­tion skills need­ed to become bud­get ana­lysts. A bud­get ana­lyst analy­ses bud­gets and eval­u­ates the finan­cial impacts of exist­ing and new ven­tures. A bud­get ana­lyst applies the prin­ci­ples of finance to pro­pos­als and projects in gov­ern­men­tal, edu­ca­tion­al, busi­ness, and non-prof­it sec­tors and offers advice on whether to pro­ceed or not. The bud­get ana­lyst is one of the most pop­u­lar entry-lev­el finance degree jobs for finance majors. Since these pro­fes­sion­als have to inter­view dif­fer­ent peo­ple with­in the orga­ni­za­tion, com­mu­ni­ca­tion skills are a must-have.

Financial Analyst

Finance majors can choose to become finan­cial ana­lysts. A finan­cial ana­lyst helps indi­vid­u­als or busi­ness­es make smart invest­ment deci­sions. The duties of a finan­cial ana­lyst may include advis­ing man­age­ment and clients on when to buy and sell, assess­ing the per­for­mance of var­i­ous bonds and stocks over time, and main­tain­ing invest­ment port­fo­lios. A finan­cial ana­lyst can work with­in a par­tic­u­lar orga­ni­za­tion or in an invest­ment firm. To work as a finan­cial ana­lyst, you need to be licensed by the Finan­cial Indus­try Reg­u­la­to­ry Author­i­ty. The Char­tered Finan­cial Ana­lyst (CFA) des­ig­na­tion is recommended.

Financial Examiner

Banks and oth­er finan­cial insti­tu­tions are reg­u­lat­ed by the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment. The gov­ern­ment, through reg­u­la­tion, pro­tects bor­row­ers from unfair loan prac­tices such as preda­to­ry lend­ing. Finan­cial exam­in­ers are employed by the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment to ensure that banks and oth­er finan­cial insti­tu­tions com­ply with all the finance laws and reg­u­la­tions set by the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment. Finance majors have the knowl­edge and skills required to take up careers as finan­cial exam­in­ers. A finan­cial exam­in­er posi­tion is one of the best entry-lev­el jobs for finance majors – no cer­ti­fi­ca­tions are required.

Financial Manager

Finance majors can devel­op the skills required to become finan­cial man­agers. A finan­cial man­ag­er is tasked with the role of min­i­miz­ing risk and max­i­miz­ing prof­it by mon­i­tor­ing an organization’s finan­cial health and activ­i­ties. Finan­cial man­agers gen­er­ate finan­cial state­ments and pro­vide guid­ance to busi­ness lead­ers in finan­cial plan­ning and direct the wealth of the com­pa­ny. Finan­cial man­agers also go with oth­er job titles such as cash man­agers or cred­it man­agers. Des­ig­na­tions such as Char­tered Finan­cial Ana­lyst (CFA) and Cer­ti­fied Trea­sury Pro­fes­sion­al (CTP) are rec­om­mend­ed for those look­ing at finan­cial man­age­ment as a career path.

Personal Financial Advisor

Per­son­al finan­cial advi­sors are very sim­i­lar to finan­cial ana­lysts. Both pro­fes­sion­als help their clients with long-term invest­ments and finan­cial plan­ning. The key dif­fer­ence between the two is that while finan­cial ana­lysts work with large busi­ness­es, per­son­al finan­cial advi­sors work with indi­vid­ual clients, one-on-one. The duties of a per­son­al advi­sor go beyond the invest­ment port­fo­lio, they help the client plan for retire­ment, pay for col­lege, buy a house, and plan for oth­er major events. Those look­ing a finance career path as per­son­al finan­cial advi­sors can enhance their career and rep­u­ta­tion with a Cer­ti­fied Finan­cial Plan­ner (CFP) certification.

A finance degree can also set you up for careers like loan offi­cer, actu­ary, stock­bro­ker, under­writ­ing, and more.

Making Money: Finance Degree Salary Out of College

What can a degree in finance get you for a salary? A lot of fac­tors affect a finance major salary. A finance degree salary, for instance, is great­ly influ­enced by pri­or expe­ri­ence, so finance degree salary out of col­lege will be a lot less than the pay of some­one with 10 years of expe­ri­ence. Grad­u­ates with years of expe­ri­ence are more like­ly to earn more than fresh grad­u­ates. A finance major salary is also affect­ed by the finance career path the stu­dent choos­es. Some finance career paths tend to have a high­er salary than oth­ers. What is the aver­age salary in finance? Accord­ing to the PayScale Col­lege Salary Report 2017–18, the aver­age finance degree salary out of col­lege $57,500. Keep in mind that this finance major salary is for grad­u­ates who’ve just left college.

The bach­e­lors in finance salary ris­es to $97,100 once the grad­u­ates have accu­mu­lat­ed sev­er­al years of expe­ri­ence in the field. A finance major gives the stu­dent a high earn­ing poten­tial as well as great grad­u­ate job prospects. Major­ing in finance opens doors to a wide range of career oppor­tu­ni­ties for finance majors across mul­ti­ple indus­tries. Before choos­ing a final career path, take into con­sid­er­a­tion your unique com­bi­na­tion of per­son­al­i­ty traits, val­ues, inter­ests, and skills. This will help you get the best out of your finance major, includ­ing your finance major salary.

Finance Professional Organizations

Despite the high num­ber of career oppor­tu­ni­ties for finance majors, get­ting a job in finance is not as easy as you might think. The num­ber of stu­dents major­ing in finance is increas­ing, which means more com­pe­ti­tion for job seek­ers. Join­ing one of the many finance pro­fes­sion­al orga­ni­za­tions is one of the best ways to gain a com­pet­i­tive edge. Finance pro­fes­sion­al orga­ni­za­tions are non-prof­its whose mis­sion is to serve the finance indus­try and the inter­ests of pro­fes­sion­als in the finan­cial sec­tor. Join­ing a finance pro­fes­sion­al orga­ni­za­tion presents an oppor­tu­ni­ty to learn, inter­act with pro­fes­sion­als in the field, and stay on top of the lat­est trends in the industry.

Some of the most pop­u­lar finance pro­fes­sion­al orga­ni­za­tions include:

• Amer­i­can Finance Asso­ci­a­tion (AFA)
• Asso­ci­a­tion for Finance Pro­fes­sion­als (AFP)
• Entrepreneur’s Orga­ni­za­tion (EO)
• Inter­na­tion­al Fed­er­a­tion of Accoun­tants (IFAC)
• Pro­fes­sion­al Account­ing Soci­ety of Amer­i­ca (PASA)

Join­ing a finance pro­fes­sion­al orga­ni­za­tion is easy – all you need to do is apply and pay the annu­al mem­ber­ship fee. And the added author­i­ty can help make the most of your degree for a finance major salary. Find an orga­ni­za­tion that match­es geo­graph­ic loca­tion, lev­el of expe­ri­ence, and indus­try spe­cial­iza­tion and become a mem­ber. Depend­ing on the orga­ni­za­tion, re-cer­ti­fi­ca­tion and spe­cial­ized train­ing may be required to join.