Teaching basic marketing accountability using spreadsheets: An exploratory perspective

Extant literature suggests that a key problem with marketing is a lack of financial accountability, and a possible way of improving the situation is to use spreadsheets to inculcate marketing accountability among future marketing executives. This study attempts to enhance our understanding of how to impart spreadsheet skills and encourage an accountability mindset among undergraduate marketing students by focusing on a course called Marketing and Money. Assessment data indicate that the course, which captures the spirit of the behavioral model of learning, does in fact enhance students' spreadsheet skills in a consistent manner. In addition, the analysis suggests that in order to increase students' self efficacy, instructors ought to try to make the course perceptually more useful rather than try to reduce its difficulty.