New DP Business Management: What to Expect

The new DP Business Management course is here, for first teaching in 2022 and first assessment in 2024. As with any curriculum change, there is likely to be some degree of apprehension – but this is actually quite normal. So, what can teachers look forward to, and get excited about, with the new curriculum?

One of the things you’ll notice when you get a chance to look at the new syllabus is that the content itself is very familiar. The main teaching units are still there, namely:

1. Introduction to business management
2. Human resource management
3. Finance and accounts
4. Marketing
5. Operations management

This should give teachers reassurance that the main content areas in our subject remain unchanged.

Note that both syllabi are currently available in the ManageBac Unit Planner for the transition year, allowing you to switch across any planned units with only a few clicks.

The IB Business Management Toolkit

One of the big changes you’ll notice is the introduction of what the IB calls the ‘Business Management Toolkit’ (the BMT). This consists of 15 different tools, theories and techniques that students can use in all aspects of the new course, including Internal and External assessments and the Business Management Extended Essay.

In the past, Business Management students have often been a little confused about which tools, theories and techniques they can use for their Internal Assessment and the Extended Essay, so the inclusion of a highly comprehensive toolkit should help them in moving forward with their assessments.

You can download the Business Management Toolkit from the IB DP Business Management Subject Page in ManageBac, or directly from the IB, using your MyIB Login.

New Concepts

Another change that teachers will notice is the removal of the CUEGIS concepts. However, concept-based learning is still integral to an IB education, so the new course will include four key concepts as part of the pedagogical framework. These are:

1. Change
2. Ethics
3. Creativity
4. Sustainability

You’ll notice that two of these key concepts carry over from the previous CUEGIS concepts, namely change and ethics. The syllabus now includes two more exciting and fitting concepts: sustainability and creativity. Having four key concepts rather than six should give us more scope to do both inquiry-based learning and concept-based learning.

A Third Paper

A further noticeable change is the inclusion of a third paper for HL students. Paper 3 will be based on a social enterprise, with students expected to answer three questions. The first question relates to a particular human need that the social enterprise seeks to meet. The second question considers the organisational challenges that are preventing the social enterprise from meeting the identified human need. And the third question requires students to recommend a plan of action to address the two organisational challenges.

A New Common Internal Assessment

Finally, the other major change is the introduction of a new common Internal Assessment (IA). This means that both SL and HL students have the same task, with the same marking criteria. The IA examines an issue or problem facing a real-world business. Students need to address this using one of the four key concepts, backed up by evidence using between three and five supporting documents. These supporting documents can be from primary and/or secondary market research sources. The word limit for the IA is 1,800 words. The common IA will make this task much easier for teachers to deliver, especially for those who have mixed classes of SL and HL students; so, this is a much-welcomed change.

I hope this brief overview gets you a little excited about the new Business Management course.

All the best to you and your students in the new academic year!