1. Micro-economics -- to me, this class analyzes the foundation of the overall Western world business philosophy. More importantly, the difference between Adam Smith and Karl Marx greatly stimulated my curiosity on many other subjects. This class is really about human nature and individual behavior.
2. Strategic marketing -- this helps me to look at the markets with a long term and dynamic view. 夫兵形似水，...水因地而製流，兵因敵而製勝。This dynamic and trend view really opened my eyes when operating in a dynamic global marketplace. At some schools, this may split into marketing and corporate strategy.
3. Finance -- this was the class on common sense and logical reasoning, instead of financial terminologies. The concepts and models were developed decades ago and they barely changed. Hard to dive into in the beginning, but once you make the full circle (along with managerial accounting), you find this is more about the way of thinking rather than playing with spreadsheets.
4. Managerial accounting -- accounting was boring, in my humble opinion, and their rules changes all the time accross different countries. Managerial accounting tries to look at the books at a higher level and serves as an important link to financial analysis.
M&A should be based on strategic planning, unless you are working for a transaction focused financial firm. The strategic planning is a long term and ongoing process, while M&A itself focuses more on the transaction, which may only last several weeks or months. Experience matters much more than the book knowledge here and many parties are involved -- attorneys, bankers, etc. The following integration is as important as the transaction, if not more important. Again, it comes with experience, not text books.
