LearnHub

That’s a quite difficult question because in the end you need all of them and running a business without one of them would in my opinion be inconceivable. From my gut feeling I would say MARKETING, no matter what business you are running (selling products or selling services). You can have brilliant people inside the company, a competent finance department, an excellent IT system, etc. but in the end the product needs to be sold otherwise you don’t have any customers in order to survive as a company.

I just had a chat with my husband – he thought the most important part in a company would be Research & Development. Well, seeing it from this perspective I would agree. He gave me the example of APPLE, how innovative they are and how much they invested in doing research. Looking at their success and the edge they have compared to its competitors, I must agree but we should not forget that in the end Research & Department would be still considered as part (initial activity) of Marketing. So, looking at the discussion question it looks as if R & D and Marketing are two different units, which I wouldn’t say …... As far as I learnt in my business studies it is considered as one part (an important one) of Marketing besides other parts. If R&D tells you that there is no demand for your product then you better focus on something else before you sell something that nobody wants and you are just wasting your money and time. But I’m curious to see what other people think …..

I’ve actually learned R&D as part of operations, the part that has to work in conjunction with marketing to develop and design the product people would want to buy… so I just counted it as a different unit of the business.

I’m not sure which one is MOST important… I do agree that marketing is up there though. You can make a great product, but if you can’t market it right nobody would ever buy it. But I also think HR is highly important… great business ideas are one thing, but in order to make anything happen- production, marketing, research, anything- you need people. Good employees provide the innovation and heart of the business, and without the human aspect no business can ever succeed.

For me HR is the most important aspect of any business, unless you have a good HR you cant have good marketing nor can you manage your finances and operations well without a good HR. Its the most important and the hardest task in any business. All others aspects come after having the right people for the right jobs.