The Core Competencies:
Attendees will gain in the following competencies as a result of the program:
- Using financial information for guiding decisions.
- Clarifying KPIs across different functions.
- Building strategic thinking and implementation orientation into their professional lives.
- Challenging the status quo of accounting/control, budgeting, and decision making.
- Recognizing the value of external standards, internal decision making requirements, and measurements of qualitative elements.
- Identifying Value Creation principles as the driving force for decision making.
Program Objectives:
This course will help you learn how to:
- Understand the content of and relationships between financial statements (income statement, balance sheet, and statement of cash flows.
- Understand how to use financial statements to evaluate the financial performance of an organization.
- Understand discounted cash flow (DCF) techniques and their application to financial decision making.
- Understand how profit margin, asset utilization, and financial leverage are used by managers to maximize the return to investors.
- Understand the budgeting process, including performance evaluation.
- Understand cost behavior and its impact on management decisions.
- Understand the need for and the methods used to allocate overhead.
- Communicate and to question financial information effectively.
Program Methodology:
This workshop will be highly participatory and your seminar leader will present, guide and facilitate learning, using a range of methods including discussions, case studies and exercises. Where appropriate, these will include real issues brought to the workshop by delegates.
Lessons learned from the seminar will be applied to your own organization. Key performance indicators (KPIs) for the critical success factors (CSFs) will focus attention on high priority action plans for taking back to your organization.
Day 1: Introduction to accounting
- What is accounting?
- What forms can accounting take.
- Definition and importance of profit.
- Decision scenarios explored.
- Funding business operations.
- Who is interested in profit?
Day 2: Cash vs. Accrual accounting.
- Cash flow forecasting and improvement.
- Accounting policies chosen by companies.
- Accounting standards.
Day 3: Financial Statements, Accounting Policies, and Reporting Standards
- Revenues & the questions.
- Direct/variable/product costs.
- Indirect/fixed/period costs.
- Mixed costs.
Day 4: Non-cash deductions: the what, the why & the how:
- Depreciation: various methods explored.
- Amortization: impairment test.
- Depletion: when & how.
- The difference between profit and cash.
- A closer look at costs and expenses.
- Profit calculations.
- Summarizing profit statements and extracting the key figures.
Day 5: Balance Sheet
- Assets – current & long term.
- Liabilities – current & long term.
- Equity – components.
- Capital employed - options.
- Managing the working capital cycle.
Day 6: Cash Flow Statement
- Operating sources/uses.
- Investing sources/uses.
- Financing sources/uses.
Day 7: Making and Communicating Decisions using Budgets:
- The master budget.
- The budgeting as a planning tool, a control mechanism, a communications device & value creation.
- Budgeting Sales to “drive” the correct budget.
- Operating budget components.
- Financial budget.
- Pro Forma Financial Statements.
- Cash Budgets.
- Capital budget.
Day 8: Interrelationship of Financial Projections
- Dynamics and Growth of the Business System – a model review.
- Flexible vs. traditional budgets – the pros & cons.
- Variance analysis as a tool for improvement & communications.
- Price and volume effects within variance analysis: state of the art.
Day 9 Financial vs. Management Accounting: differences and similarities
- Objectives of Managerial Accounting.
- Managerial Versus Financial Accounting.
- Role of the Managerial Accountant.
- Financial accounting: what we show to the public.
- Objectives of financial accounting.
- Role of financial accountant.
- Cost terminology: variable, fixed, controllable, non-controllable, incremental, sunk, opportunity, and relevant.
- Cost behaviors in Cost-Volume-Profit scenarios: contribution margin and fixed costs.
- Breakeven and targeted net income scenarios.
- Cost/Benefit analysis.
Day 10: Ultimatum Goal of Planning – Valuation, Business Performance & Decision Making
- Definitions of Value.
- Responsibility centers: cost, profit, and investment.
- Measuring responsibility center performance.
- Segment reporting internally and externally.
- Business Valuation from multiple perspectives.
- Managing for Shareholder Value.
- Shareholder Value Creation in Perspective.
- Evolution of Value-Based Methodologies in planning and budgeting.
- Creating Value in Restructuring and Combinations beyond planning and reporting- the case for real change!
PLACE: Madrid (SPAIN)
VENUE (TBC): HOTEL EMPARADOR (Gran Via 53, 28013, Madrid, SPAIN)
LANGUAGE: English/French
