Developing Strategic Insights with Financial Integration

Developing Strategic Insights with Financial Integration

OBJECTIVES

• Successfully build an integrated planning, budgeting and reporting process
• Understand costs behaviour more accurately
• Deliver more timely and useful information to decision makers
• Improve you the budgeting/financial skills required for better decision-making, whether for your continuing business or project or a new business venture
• Explain typical costing and budgeting terminology used in business

WHO SHOULD ATTEND?

• Accountants responsible for budget preparation and management reporting
• Process professionals who require a more in-depth understanding of integrated planning and budgeting techniques
• Financial Planners and Cost Analysts
• Line heads with direct planning and budgeting responsibility
• Professional advisers
• Account Personnel and Business Consultants

COURSE OUTLINE

DAY 1

Budgets and Strategy in Today’s International Environment

• Organizational planning framework
• The product / information / decision support cycle
• Strategic, tactical, and operational forecasts
• The strategic approach to business planning
• Various strategic and tactical approaches to business planning
• The international business environment

DAY 2

The Business Plan and Budget Development

• Developing the business plan
• Identification of key value drivers
• Achieving objectives
• Zero base budgeting
• Activity based budgeting
• Rolling budgets
• Developing the Cash Budget

DAY 3

Analyzing the Applicability of Historical Data Using Excel®

• Problems of forecasting
• Using historical data to help predict the future
• Forecasting
• Sales volume
• Development of Time Series Models using histograms, moving averages, exponential smoothing, and regression analysis
• Using Regression Analysis as a predictor and estimator
• Mastering the use of Exponential Smoothing as a Data Analysis tool

DAY 4

Using Activity-Based Budgeting and Cost Analysis Techniques

• Cost behaviour and breakeven analysis
• Activity based costing
• Budgeting for Processes rather than Departments
• Defining Key Cost Drivers
• Defining Key Activities
• Developing the Activity-Based Budget

DAY 5

Capital budgeting and project appraisal

• Identify the various types of capital projects
• Discuss the capital project evaluation process
• The impact time has on the value of money.
• Using WACC and ROIC as benchmarks
• Determining the initial and subsequent capital project cash flows
• Development of the “Hurdle Rate” for capital projects
• Evaluate capital projects by applying NPV, IRR, ARR Payback models