Professional ServicesA knowledge-based professional or business-services role.
Bright OutlookOccupation O*NET expects to grow rapidly, have many openings, or be new and emerging in the years ahead.Source: O*NET Bright Outlook
Remote-FriendlyA role that can often be performed partly or fully remotely.
Business Operations Career Pathways
Drive organizational success through business analysis, consulting, and financial strategy. Denver's growing business hub offers diverse opportunities.
Median Salary
$83,096
Statewide industry median
10-Year Growth
+16%
Statewide projection
Pathway Roles
13
Pathway roles
Required Education
Bachelor's
Business Administration
Explore Colorado Business Operations
Where Colorado's startup energy meets business operations
Business and operations careers span sales, marketing, HR, entrepreneurship, and back-office roles across every Colorado industry and employer.
The big picture
Colorado's CTE and workforce systems explicitly organize business and marketing training for practical early entry.
In Colorado, business careers build across these day-to-day activities:
Coordinating sales and customer relationships
Managing schedules and resource allocation
Analyzing operations and financial data
Marketing products and services
Leading small teams or departments
Supporting entrepreneurs and startup growth
MANAGEMENT ANALYST MEDIAN
$105,670
Representative Colorado wage for a business operations role using OEWS data.
Colorado's Business Administration pathway covers essentials like accounting basics, leadership, and customer service. Many students combine work-based learning while earning credentials.
Operations, HR, sales, and marketing roles exist in aerospace, tech, healthcare, construction, retail, and government. Combine a business foundation with industry expertise.
Colorado's tech and startup ecosystems make entrepreneurship, operations, and go-to-market work especially visible. Small-business expos, startup events, and chambers of commerce offer real networking.
Finance, scheduling, vendor coordination, project controls, and administrative work move organizations forward behind the scenes. These roles often pay well and offer stability.
People from retail, military, healthcare, and education transition successfully into business roles. Communication, organization, and the ability to make processes efficient are highly valued.
CRM tools, Excel, bookkeeping, and customer-success experience are learned quickly and valued everywhere. Short certificates can launch you into supervisor or back-office work.
Veterans, retail supervisors, healthcare administrators, and project coordinators bring communication, planning, and people skills that transfer directly into business operations and management.
Drive organizational success through business analysis, consulting, and financial strategy. Denver's growing business hub offers diverse opportunities.
Median salary
$83,096
10-year growth
+16%
Pathway roles
13
About this pathway
Continuously Improving Businesses:
Plan. Organize. Coordinate. There's a lot of responsibility riding on the shoulders of business operations workers - but a lot of flexibility too as you can move from industry to industry with these careers.
Technology Affects Everything: The exploding range of applications in web services, mobile and the Internet of Things is transforming business operations. Understanding how technology can improve business operations can lead to great opportunities!
Creative + Nimble: Colorado is ranked 4th in the U.S. for start-up activity. Working in business operations for a start-up means taking on many roles, being creative and nimble.
Choose Your Industry: Business skills are an important part of the success of all industries. Employers have identified a shortage of these skills in Energy/Renewables, Agriculture, Construction, and Transportation, making these great industries for career advancement opportunities.
Roles in this pathway (13)
Salary ranges are career-ladder estimates. Occupation pages show unique job postings where available.