Hammer business graduate in final (7)
I believe the answer is:
lambast
'hammer' is the definition.
The answer and definition can be both to do with contact as well as being verbs in their base form.
Perhaps there's an association between them I don't understand?
'business graduate in final' is the wordplay.
'business graduate' becomes 'MBA' (Master of Business Administration degree).
'in' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'final' becomes 'last' (synonyms).
'mba' inserted into 'last' is 'LAMBAST'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for lambast that I've seen before include "Reprimand" , "Criticise severely" , "Be harsh critic of" , "Beat severely" , "Berate" .)