Finance in Business
Case study workshop for managers in business

Carefully chosen case studies aligned with interactive and focused training will inspire our clients and transform business education into practical learning and application. And make learning a lot of fun too! Once you go through a real life business situation you will never forget the tools learned. This is not easy to achieve with a presentation or lecture.

Real-life decision-making will enable you to learn theory while developing at the same time a range of vital skills like: negotiation, analysis, defending your view and challenging others’ views. You will be careful in making decisions based on too little information!

You will experience changing your mind once, twice, even three times before you make your final decision, just like you test (and taste) products in a festival! This cannot happen in a lecture or presentation.

Your confidence will be enhanced to its maximum. You will then be your own boss!

This training module is addressed to participants without formal education in finance, who, because of their day to day needs, are involved in a financial process and are required to apply and interpret information contained in financial statements.

After completing this training module, you will be able to:

Programme

• Constructing the balance sheet and income statement (case study)
• Key balance sheet and income statement positions – rules for recognition and measurement (exercises), including:
  • Property, plant and equipment
  • Intangible assets
  • Financial instruments
  • Provisions
• Constructing the cash flow statement and the statement of changes in equity – what they show and how to link them to information presented in the balance sheet and income statement (exercises)
• Financial ratios – construction, interpretation, advantages and disadvantages of principal ratios (exercises)
• Major case study – just by looking at the numbers and the ratios you will be able to:
  • Identify problems and their root causes
  • Link the various strategies together
  • Come up with solutions to improve the health of the company in the medium as well as the long term
• Major financial accounting regulations in the EU and abroad (International Financial Reporting Standards and US GAAP) – what they are and who applies them
• What you can find out by reading the auditor’s opinion
• Creative accounting – what to look out for when reading financial statements (exercises)

Finance 2 - Measuring and Monitoring Performance

Overview

• Following on from Finance 1, this course will enable participants to obtain an in–depth insight into more advanced financial topics. The orientation of the course is more towards management accounting than just accounting — the audience will acquire skills in participating in key strategic decisions like costing and pricing as well as in any efforts to improve the performance of the organization.
• Advanced topics like Activity Based Budgeting, Relevant Costing, Variance Analysis and Pricing Methods will also be introduced through case studies.
• The entire course is case–study based. Real-life case studies from the Harvard Business School will be used during the course.

Benefits

• Understand how business decisions should be made based on relevant information and calculations. Identification of the right information is essential.
• Optimise the use of Working Capital.
• Analyse diversions from the plan and take corrective action in both the short-term and the long-term
• Participate in the improvement of performance of your organization.

For whom?

• Owners of companies
• Managers of finance or non-finance functions
• Internal and External Auditors
• All professionals wishing to broaden and deepen their skills in finance

Key features of this training module

Programme

• Budgeting and Control: Purposes; systems and types of budgets; preparation - including cash forecasts and expected values; (exercises)
• Costing and Management Accounting: Fixed and Flexible Budgets; Activity Based Costing (ABC) versus traditional methods of costing - (exercises and case studies)
• Decision-making Techniques – Relevant/Economic Cost Analysis; Identifying and calculating Relevant Costs from given data and for specific situations in the decision-making process; Application of the concept of opportunity Costs; Pricing Decisions; Dealing with Risk and Uncertainty (case studies)
• Variance Analysis – From Standard Costing to Variances; Sales and Quantity Variances; Planning and Operating Variances; Performance Analysis; (case studies)
• Cost-Volume Analysis: Calculation and interpretation of the Break-Even Point and the Margin of safety; Relevance to the operational as well as financial gearing of the entity; The importance of Contribution in decision-making; (case studies)

Finance 3 - Financial Management

Overview

• How do you assess whether an investment project is worth the while? And how do you choose between projects that seem to give the same future cash flows? Having taken all factors involved, does the chosen project finally add value to the firm? And what exactly is Value?
• How do financial markets determine interest rates, foreign exchange rates and other financial variables affecting your company?
• Are derivatives useful or only for gamblers? How can you make use of derivatives to protect your company from risks and add value to it? Learn how to hedge the financial risk of your firm, whether it is price you are hedging against or interest rates or currency fluctuations.

Benefits

• Understand, which of the investment projects considered by your company are worth initiating, and which are not.
• Feel more confident to take part in discussions on current financial and economic issues.
• Apply hedging techniques in real life.
• Be able to identify financial risks which your company is exposed to and propose practical solutions to mitigate them.

For whom?

Key features of this training module 

Programme

• Time value of money – present value, future value, discounting techniques (exercises)
• Methods of evaluating investment decisions – net present value (NPV), internal rate of return (IRR), payback period, real options (case study)
• Cost of capital – weighted average cost of capital, adjusting for risk, decisions on project financing (case study)
• Sensitivity analysis in situations of uncertainty (exercises)
• Interest rates – what they are, how they are determined, why they change? (exercises)
• Foreign exchange rates – analysis of current trends in major currency pairs (case study)
• Financial markets structure – segments, markets and players
• Derivative instruments as tools for financial risk hedging (exercises):
  • Forward and futures contracts
  • Options
  • Swaps
• Correct and incorrect uses of multiple derivative strategies (case study)
• What happens when financial markets stop functioning rationally– genesis, chronology and mechanics of the 2008 credit crisis. Discussion of the debt crisis in the Eurozone periphery countries as well as other current events in the financial markets
• Lessons learnt from the „options crisis” of 2008 in Poland from the perspective of corporations and financial institutions