Financial Analyst Career Advice

[stewbone]

I am a senior at a smaller state university and I will be graduating soon with a bachelors in Economics & Finance. Over the past 6 months as I have been looking through job openings I have noticed a steady trend, which is the increasing interest in employers wanting/expecting analysts to have some form of programming/database experience. (C++, Oracle Hyperion, SAS, ect)

I am currently employed at the US Army Corps of Engineers as an analyst and even there I lack the fundamental skills to use SQL databases and other SAP databases such as BusinessOne.

I have two electives left to take at my university and I would like to use them in programming/computer science, so my question for the forum is which two to take. I do not have any computer programming experience.

The university has two divisions I can choose. Computer Mgmt Info Systems or Computer Science. The following are my options:

1a) Visual basic programming
1b) Java programming for business

or

2a) Introduction to Computing I (intermediate difficulty programming language with problem solving and lab)
2b) Introduction to Computing II (Language syntax; basic design methods; algorithms; and abstraction)


tldr; have 2 electives, which 2 programming related courses should I choose to well round my skill set coming out of university?

Thanks

[billzo]

Hi. I found this a little late. A computer programmer with an educational background in Finance/Economics would be useful in the investment and banking industry. But I don't think so much in basic corporate financial analysis. In Finance, a CFA or CPA would be more beneficial than computer programming knowledge. Financial analysts do have to dig for data, so knowledge of databases and creating queries would be helpful.

If you are going to do anything, do something where you can learn hard skills. Learning C/C++ and possibly Java and certainly anything Microsoft (C#, etc.) along with SQL is going to be useful to businesses. Your first set of options will give you hard skills whereas your second set will give you broader, general knowledge. Go with the hard skills.