Training for Financial Awareness
Developing Essential Skills
Published on 28. April 2002
Book
Paperback/Softback
402 pages
978-0-566-08370-9 (ISBN)
Description
'The success of Creative Kitchens took their management team rather by surprise. Since their start-up, four years ago, everyone has been working hard to keep up with the increasing pace of new orders. At today's management meeting Sharon Bentley, the company's management accountant, drops a bombshell. The Bank has asked for a thorough review of the company's trading activities before they can sanction any further increase in the overdraft facility.' From the opening session, Training for Financial Awareness presents a scenario with which any manager can empathize. The manual provides the trainer with a rigorous, professional and yet fun resource to teach managers the basics of the financial processes. As the story of Creative Kitchens unfolds, so the accompanying exercises enable the participants to discover more of the financial jigsaw. The eight free-standing sessions, a total of 29 activities, include exercises both on compiling and using financial data. The sessions may be used independently, or built into a complete 'finance for non-financial managers' programme. The authors provide instructions for using the exercises, model questions and answers to help build on the learning. There is also an overview of the key learning points to help the facilitator structure the exercise and ensure everything is covered. The most effective management training is that which has empathy for the environment and the day-to-day problems faced by the participants. This the authors understand only too well. They approach finance as a management issue (rather than an accounting one) and, consequently, provide materials that will help any financial trainer engage and involve their audience in learning.
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Taylor & Francis Ltd
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Dimensions
Height: 297 mm
Width: 203 mm
Weight
1814 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-566-08370-9 (9780566083709)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Mike Bolton worked in new product development for a number of years before joining the Business School of Leeds Polytechnic. Since then he has worked on consultancy projects including business planning, marketing and training services and has spent time in China, Uzbekistan and Azerbaijan. He first met his co-author working as Associate Director of Materials Development for the CESaME project, an EU funded project to develop a European network of business coaches. Chris Singer spent 16 years in ICL Sales and Marketing, finishing as Vice President of Marketing in the US. Since then he has been a founder of Aregon, originally a State-owned company formed to export British software; Managing Director of Granada Microcomputer Services, which he took from start-up to weekly sales of over AGBP200,000; and has founded Singer Electronics which was first into the market with digital voice recording. Since 1994 Chris has undertaken a number of consultancy assignments in Eastern Europe, principally in Russia, Transcaucasia, Mongolia and the Ukraine.
Content
Part I General Introduction: Introduction; Session selector; Session synopses; Glossary. Part II The Sessions: Session 1 What's This Business All About? Using a SWOT Analysis To Find Out: Creative Kitchens Ltd - its strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. Session 2 Finding Out Where The Money's Gone: How the money flows in and out; Last year's profit; What does the Profit and Loss Account show about our performance? Session 3 So You've Made a Profit? What Else Does The Profit and Loss Account Tell You? Which profit is the real profit?; More sales make us more money, don't they?; What does the Profit and Loss Account show about out costs?; What do we do now? Session 4 Have You Been Increasing Your Worth? What the Balance Sheet Tells You: What do we own and who paid for it?; What the last four years should have told them; How secure is the business? Session 5 What's Happened To The Flow of Money? Using Ratios To Find Out: Where has all the money gone?; Measuring the flow of money; How well are we using the money?; Using the pyramid of ratios. Session 6 Ratios Can Save Money and Make You More Profit: Where has all the profit gone?; Where have all the extra costs come from?; Where's the Work in Progress hiding?; Why so many Finished Goods?; Accounting policies need to be understood; Presentation of progress to the Managing Director. Session 7 Are Your Costs Behaving Themselves?: But surely a cost is just a cost?; The way costs behave; Labour costs should add value; Deviation isn't always a crime. Session 8 How The Figures Can Help You Make Better Marketing Decisions: How debtors dam up the cash flow; What should we do with the Overheads?; Prices, profits and breaking even; Sensitivity, or how break-even analysis can take away the pain.