Santa Monica College Importance of Quantitative Skills Questions

For each Discussion, you are responsible for two parts. Be sure to POST YOUR RESPONSE TO YOUR GROUP DISCUSSION topic, and also, please COMMENT ON ANOTHER STUDENT POST by bringing something new to the conversation (another perspective, disagree, other facts, another concept, different company, etc.). Please avoid posting a simple agreement or compliment, and reply with a well thought out comment.

Group #1 Discussion Topic:

Combining Quantitative and Communication Skills (LO 12.1, LO 12.4, LO 12.5, LO 12.6)

Lloyd C. Blankfein, chair and CEO of Goldman Sachs, was asked, “What would you like business schools to teach more of, or less of?” He responded:

Look, I think it’s very important to teach people to have a healthy respect for facts and information. And you know, to paraphrase Keynes, “to change minds when facts change.” That’s why I think certain careers—and maybe not intuitive careers—do very well. There’s a lot of lawyers floating around Wall Street. There’s a lot of engineers. A lot of people who deal in facts and have an appreciation for facts. A quantitative thing is very helpful. I was a social studies major, but you need to be numerate. If you have those good quantitative skills, it’s very, very helpful.6

Based on Blankfein’s comments and your own opinions, respond to 2-3 of the following questions:

1. Why are quantitative skills so highly valued in various business disciplines?
2. How important do you think quantitative skills will be to your career? In what ways?
3. What are your strongest areas in terms of quantitative skills? Weakest areas?
4. What are your strongest areas in terms of spreadsheet software? Weakest areas?
5. What are five goals you have for improving your quantitative skills?