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What follows is not a lecture. Our goal is only to provide a few benchmarks to students and professionals to help them in their reflections on the world of business and perhaps guide them in their professional choices.

A business rests on four pillars:

1 – economic;

2 – financial;

3 – human;

4 – legal.

It is an organization that aims to offer goods and/or services. One or more people have raised capital and risked their money in the hope of earning it. A business is a human adventure. Managing a business means managing risks.

To exist, the enterprise must have a legal status, which therefore makes its president responsible before the law. There are many legal forms: public limited company, SARL (société a responsabilité limitée, a private limited liability company), non-profit association, as per the 1901 law, etc. Its foreign subsidiaries must comply with local laws.

In France, size differentiates VSEs (very small enterprises or businesses: less than 10 employees), SMEs (small or medium enterprises or businesses: less than 250 employees and a turnover of less than 50 million euros), and medium-sized enterprise (between 250 and 4,999 employees and a turnover not exceeding 1.5 billion euros). Beyond that, it is the domain of very large companies and multinationals.

A company’s headquarters has certain functions: Fayolism is still relevant! These functions are often shown by a company’s organizational structure. This generally includes some or all of the following entities:

– a headquarters that brings together the president, managing director, executive management, communication, human resources department (HRD), financial department (taxes, treasury), planning department (strategy), legal agreements, research department, industrial management, engineering management, sales management, marketing management, project director(s), safety and security management, branch managers, SBU¹ manager(s), purchasing department, administration (accounting, payroll, IT), country delegate(s)²;

1 – one or more production facilities (plants, workshops);

2 – distribution (logistics, warehouses, etc.);

3 – research means (laboratories, test means);

4 – technical services, after-sales service, application laboratories;

5 – commercial services (sales reps, etc.);

6 – subsidiaries (national, foreign);

7 – JVs (joint ventures).

A small to medium-sized company that includes only one site (headquarters + plant) will have all these functions distributed between a few individuals donning multiple hats:

1 – so-called corporate functions are called on staff (legal agreements, safety, etc.) when they support so-called on line functions such as manufacturing. We can note the importance that communication has taken over the years;

2 – in general, an executive committee (board) of a few people, including the president and the general management, takes the essential decisions, the directions that will be implemented by the lower levels;

3 – the HRD is often the first contact for anyone looking to join a company;

4 – as we will see below, the digital revolution is creating new roles; Data Officer, Data Scientist. These roles may report to the president, to a board member or to the industrial management. It all depends on the importance that the company gives this new function at a given time.

Start-ups (short for start-up companies) work on something new; an innovative object, a new drug that leaves hope for big profits when research comes to an end. They look for funding to survive. Another term has appeared recently, mainly in the digital field: that of a “unicorn”, a company whose market capitalization reaches one billion dollars. The famous Silicon Valley saw the prodigious birth of these megacompanies, launched in a garage or a student room.