James is a very passionate and communicative lecturer. I really love the way he presents the materials because it makes all the materials are easily digested and understood. Two thumbs up!!

It is an average introduction to certain financial aspects. Where i really feel it was let down was in 1) the discussions with the external expert. You need to find a new expert more engaging with the subject matter. Was very dry and I was willing her on not to fail. Not a sentiment I should be feeling in a paid course. 2) The capstone project was too much too quickly. You should run through a similar project first using similar details and documentation. The instructor should run through this dry run step by step just as the student will do in the final exam. In other words, the jump from introducing NPV etc to a final project with lots of different documents was too much.

Love the instructor, his delivery is on point but a little bit more clarity is needed on finance terminologies

Very good overview of finance. For everyone looking, this is not specific to personal finance, but rather a general view and introduction to the most general topics. And a great one at that!

I am a mechanical engineer looking to change careers and go into financial management. This course gave me the confidence that my choice to go into finance was well placed. The course content is well designed for a newbie like me. This course gave me the motivation and confidence i needed to learn more finance related concepts.

Course content was very good but the certificate was a joke - not worth the money. The certificate is signed "Signature" and lists the professor as John Doe, and there appears to be no way to contact anyone at Coursera with complaints.

Prof James is a very good teacher not only because he is very thorough with his own understanding of finance fundamentals but also he genuinely likes teach. His animated gestures keeps one hooked on to the course. The exercises are very helpful to drive the concepts home

Highly recommend to take up the course for anyone who wants to understand the world of finance

Great Course, Very solid start for those who are trying to enter Finance world.

It makes you love this field if you are not familiar with it and have no previous experience.

Great Job Professor.

As a operation head of R&D center, I used to make business case for proposing requirement of equipment using help of Finance. Now I understood all details and I can do it myself. The important point is that I can now go back to those spread sheet and understand how payback was considered. I would like to thank Coursera and Professor James and Rice university for this wonderful opportunity to learn.

I specifically like conversation with real world finance person.

Thank you

I had no background of Finance before I enrolled for this course except that I had good mathematics base. I found this course very beneficial as it explained the fundamentals of Finance in a very understandable language and pace. The course structure is well organized and it is absolutely worth enrolling. This course is coming handy to me for my CFA preparations as it has built a strong understandings of basics.

I am an Electrical Engineer working in the mining industry. I am currently in a managerial position and frequently need to make decisions on whether to implement a certain project or not and what benefit would it bring to my company. I learnt a great deal from this course. I thoroughly enjoyed Prof. Weston's each lecture. There was so much enthusiasm in his voice that kept me hooked to this course and nudged me towards earning my verifiable certificate. Thank you and keep bringing such nice courses.

This course is so good I couldn't wait to finish it asap! While the instructor (which I became very found of) is clear he noticeably understands the underlying aspects of Finance, presenting it on a very didatic and interesting way. I took this course because I wanted to start doing company's valuation, and I can tell you that I'm much closer to doing so.

Some food for thought:

I'd like to see the guest talk more, I felt that the professor kind of directioned his speech a lot to what was said in class. I believe that she could have brought some real life examples and had gone deeper on them.

I'd also have appreciated a class that had examined a real balance sheet example as well.

Regardless of this, if you don't know anything about finance, or if you know just a little bit, there is a high chance that you'll find what you're looking for in this course. Congratulations to Mr. James Weston and his team for doing this favour to the community.

This is a very well designed course. Taking you through basics and in the end puts you in a real business scenario where you are expected to take a decision based on the tools and concepts you learnt.

Very good learning experience.

The course is ideal for people having an interest in Finance! No prior knowledge needed!

The Prof. makes sure you are involved throughout the lecture!

Very good course that tackles the most important parts of finance and accounting in a firm. The only problem I had was that a lot of technical terms were somewhat poorly explained, and week 3 was a bit confusing. Still, I would recommend this course to anyone that is interested in finance.

Need to have some basic background in Accounting (ie. Income statement, Balance Sheet) to understand this course. Still need to refer to other resources or videos to understand the formulas.

Its a good place to start. I would recommend this to a friend who has no clue whatsoever about finance and is looking at possibly heading in a new direction. Videos are well sized, clear and articulate. Homework assignments are well designed for this level. Although I would have liked it more had the capstone quiz given me the opportunity to work independently with the numbers given in the case rather than giving me a template to work with. Seemed a little spoon fed to me. All in all a good course to pursue for beginners.

Efficient and clear introduction to the subject, though not a lot of material. Interviews are not very useful. A written "handout" list of definitions, acronyms and formulae would be useful as a future reference (for those who didn't take notes).

The course is well prepared and the teacher is very good, the exercises however are not 100% explained and in the tests there could be issues

the course is fruitful because it presents basic concepts and simple variables that are crucial to know.

HOWEVER, the capestone case is very very hard to finish, it requires collaboration through the discussion plateform or else, you will not be able to do it by yourself

This was the first online course which I have ever taken, and I have to say that I absolutely loved it! The course is informative; the professor is excellent; the tests are relevant and practical, and the course is fairly priced -- especially compared to some of the other courses available on Coursera. The online material -- as in videos, documents, links and transcripts work very well -- and it has certainly led me to believe that I have received value for enrolling. I recommend this course to students and individuals who have a basic knowledge of economics (opportunity cost, etc) and have a basic interest in accounts and finance. Highly recommended! Thanks Professor Weston, Rice University and Coursera for a wonderful course! :)

Hello everyone,

I am a person from technical background who had an interest towards finance. The course started with the basic idea is to how actually things work in the field of finance and accounting, to financial statements and basics of how stock market works. I am satisfied to say that I got to learn a lot through the course and the instructor James Weston was quite through and simple to understand. I would recommend this course to every Non-Finance professional or student out there. Thank you Coursera!

I really appreciated the focus on the conceptual elements of financial decision-making and the capital budgeting process. The video lectures were a great length for me (aka not too long) and included plenty of visual examples that helped me understand what was being taught. This was a great overview for someone who, like me, doesn't have a super strong foundation in math and has never taken a finance course before, but is interested in understanding these principles better.

This course as the title suggests is actually required for non finance professionals to get an understanding of concepts in Finance. A very good and well structured course.

Very engaging and effective. Perhaps if stretched over a 13 weeks period or wrapped up in an official master, it would have been even more gratifying. Food for thought?