Budgeting and Business Planning

OVERVIEW

This course will provide not only the theoretical background but also the necessary skills to build world-class standards in your planning, budgeting, performance measurement, and reporting system. The course will concentrate on imparting to delegates how to learn the concepts, processes, and techniques of budgeting and business planning to be better able to carry out their budgeting and business planning tasks and responsibilities.

By combining techniques analysis, problems and examples with real case studies the course provides delegates with key cost awareness and budgetary skills, which are essential in managing and controlling processes/projects in times of increasing global competition where the budgets are inextricably linked with both strategy formulation and cost analysis.

OBJECTIVES

• Build an integrated planning, budgeting, and reporting process
• Understand cost behavior more accurately
• Deliver more timely and useful information to decision-makers
• Improve the budgeting/financial skills required for better decision-making
• Appreciate the need to link projects within budgets

COURSE CONTENTS

1. Budgets and Strategy in Today’s Business Practice

• 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

2. The Business Plan and Budget Development

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

3. Analyzing the Applicability of Historical Data Using Excel®

• Problems of forecasting
• Using historical data to help predict the future
• Forecasting
• Development of Time Series Models
• Using Regression Analysis as a predictor and estimator
• Mastering the use of Exponential Smoothing as a Data Analysis tool

4. Using Activity-Based Budgeting and Cost Analysis Techniques

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

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
• Development of the "Hurdle Rate" for capital projects
• Evaluate capital projects by applying NPV, IRR, and ARR Payback mode