Innovative Forecasting and Budgeting: Moving Beyond the Traditional Techniques

Overview

Have major developments over the past few years told us that planning doesn’t work? It might seem that way. But, obviously some organizations survived far better than others due to their ability to handle unexpected change. Forecasting and budgeting are two words that often draw an adverse reaction from many financial professionals. Recent developments have shown that our planning process must be far nimbler and allow our organization to shift rapidly. This course moves beyond the traditional techniques and uncovers easier ways to complete the process while cutting out the political pitfalls that end up causing a lack of accountability and can be demotivating to the staff.

Highlights

• Building change into the planning process
• Sales/income plan
• Intermediate planning
• Technology plan
• Capital equipment planning
• One-year operating plan
• Monthly planning
• Cash plan
• Risk plan

Prerequisites

Experience in financial management of a small or midsize company

Designed For

CFOs, controllers, and finance professionals.

Objectives

• Develop a one-year operating plan (formerly referred to as a budget)
• Avoid the political pitfalls that often come with the forecasting and budgeting processes and inhibit change
• Maximize the usefulness of the forecasts developed for the organization
• Perform a financial risk analysis
• Perform an EVA analysis (PV, ROI and Modified ROI)
• Be familiar with the results of the case studies and exercises that reinforce key learning points throughout thecourse

Preparation

None