Most business decisions of investors, managers, analysts, consultants and entrepreneurs require you to assess the future. You will learn a different approach to make better decisions using the fundamentals of businesses. Students who have taken this course often comment on how it transforms their thinking and analysis. It also is a useful “capstone” to the MBA core.

We consider both a startup and public companies and learn how to use both financial reports and supplementary information sources to understand the business to be able to make better forecasts and decisions.

We will cover some topics/concepts that are in financial statement analysis, earnings quality, security analysis and valuation classes. But I have never received feedback that the coverage in this course is redundant irrespective of other courses taken. We will focus on understanding how businesses create/destroy value and how to change this, and discuss if this is in the price or not.

You draw on > 30 years of my experience: advising and analyzing companies, creating a new framework for analysis and investment, as part of senior management at Morgan Stanley, as an angel investor, a board member, an academic researcher, auditor and participant in accounting regulation. My objective is to pass on as much of this knowledge to you as possible.

Trevor Harris

Arthur J. Samberg Professor Emeritus of Professional Practice

Professor Harris' research and practical experience has covered most areas of the use of accounting information for valuation, investment and management decisions, with a particular focus on global aspects. He originally joined the Columbia Business School faculty in 1983, and was the Jerome A. Chazen Professor of International Business, Director of the Chazen Institute of International Business and Chair of the Accounting Department, prior to...

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