Hi I’d like to major in business but I don’t know What business major should I choose… I’d love a job where I have to use math and computer programs like excel. I was thinking about being a financial analyst but I don’t know if I have to do power point presentations on front of alot of people I mean it’s alright for me if I have to talk to my coworkers and tell them my proposals but I wouldn’t like to do power point presentations every week or so. Do you know if financial analyst have to do that or not? Or What business major don’t have to do power point presentations in real work?
PowerPoint presentations are so fun and easy! Why would you let something like that lower your opportunities? 
I think you might like something on the accounting or information systems route. You can also be a financial analyst with degrees in these areas.
There’s probably no business discipline where you can guarantee that you will never have to do PowerPoint presentation. Accounting and information systems are especially not good choices if you don’t want to do any presentations since a huge part of those jobs is explaining what you’re doing to decision-makers and many of them will want some kind of presentation.
Where I work (public accounting), it’s very client-driven and different clients (either external clients and customers) or managers have different expectations and preferences that you have to meet. Some clients or managers hate PowerPoint too and never use it; they’d rather read a document or just talk about an issue. But other clients or managers prefer PowerPoint. I’ve had clients that don’t just want PowerPoints but they even want the PowerPoint to have a uniform look – probably so they can steal it and pass it off as their own work later. )
It’s also something that’s very situational as well; in many cases, people at a meeting want to have your PowerPoint slides to refer to later; it’s hard to remember every word spoken at a presentation weeks or months later so it’s common to supply a printout of the slides or meeting minutes to people before or after.
(I personally hate PowerPoint too; it’s too easy for people to just cut and paste huge blocks of text and read them out loud. But if someone wants a deck on a given topic from me then I’ll prepare and deliver it because that’s my job. It’s probably unrealistic to expect that any job won’t have anything like that to be honest.)
Looks like @DmitriR knows his stuff. Ignore everything I said.
Haha I wouldn’t say that. I actually agree with you that it doesn’t make sense to use PowerPoint as a filter for business jobs. I actually think that accounting and information systems are great career paths. It makes more sense to spend some time trying to get over the aversion to PowerPoint instead; that way, the OP can have all of these options open instead of trying to look for a professional job that guarantees 0 presentations.
@DmitriR so how is that some companies have like 100 employees or more and only 10 people have to be in meetings and do power point presentations? Are those meetings and power point presentations for the administrative team?
I’m not sure what your question is referring to. My experience is with financial analysts and people who work for professional services companies (accounting, consulting). It’s difficult to spend a lot of time working in that kind of environment and never have to do a presentation. Not every client or every job will involve those things, but if your goal is to avoid PowerPoint presentations completely then it probably makes sense to seek a job outside of these areas.
Any job where you have to communicate the results of your work to a client or boss runs the risk that they will ask for this communication in PowerPoint form; not every client/boss will ask for this but it will be difficult to duck these requests your entire career just because PowerPoint is so popular.
@DmitriR in front of how many people you have to present when you do power point presentations?
Depends on what it’s for. The biggest I’ve seen was at a kickoff meeting for an engagement where there were about 20-25 people there. But the careers we’re talking about are so diverse that there’s no way to give an average number for all companies everywhere, if that’s what you’re driving at.
Regardless of the career path you end up pursuing, you will be using your communication skills more and more as you get into higher/management positions. Everyone has their insecurities and is afraid of public speaking; unfortunately there is no way around it =/. As Dmitri mentioned, it is very unrealistic to assume that you will be able to find a career in the business world without doing many presentations.
As for major, it really depends on your personality and lifestyle. I am currently an accounting student so my opinion will obviously be biased. Surprisingly, I’ve discovered that in accounting we actually do not use much math; excel does everything. If you do go for accounting, mastering excel and written communication will serve you better than actual math skills/calculus/statistics. Good luck.
@DmitriR do you think I can become a financial analyst with a bachelor’s degree in business administration?
I’m not sure. I don’t see anything that would stop you but I personally am not involved in hiring financial analysts so I could be wrong about that. I think the best thing that you can do for yourself is to try and seek out externships and internships as soon as you are able to so that you can explore different career options and learn about what it’s like. I know that sometimes it’s easy to get too down on ourselves and assume that we can’t handle something just because it’s not our strong suit, but once you actually do it you might find it’s not as bad as you think it is.
get a double bachelors in accounting and information systems thats what i am doing
Selk64760 do you have to do a lot of presentations in college as an accounting major?
selk64760
Instead of trying to find a major where you won’t have to ever give a presentation, I’m going to just tell you to learn to be comfortable with it lol…
Every business is driven by profits and those profits can either come from your consumers or your clients. Either way, you will have to present your marketing pitch or performance to them. You are effectively limiting your career potential because communicating to external parties is a requirement of every manager and leader. A lot of colleges these days have been making courses that focus on presentation skills a requirement as well (both of my schools did).