Excidian’s Basic Business Finance course is a one-day, instructor-led, high-level overview of the topics that are essential to understanding how your company operates financially. This course demonstrates financial skills and relates them to current events so that participants can begin to make connections between the topics covered and their own business.
Module 1 focuses on why it is important for employees to understand corporate decisions. Topics include 1) how your company makes money; 2) its competitive advantage; and 3) how each employee can add value. Module 1 concludes with an introduction to the three financial statements.
In Module 2 participants learn basic concepts of the three major financial statements —Income Statement, Balance Sheet and Cash Flow Statement. The purpose of each statement, individual line items, general construction and formulas that govern each statement are reviewed. Participants learn how these three major financial statements are interconnected. Real-world examples are discussed and related to the company’s industry.
Module 3 describes the major sections of an Annual Report. Participants gain a cursory understanding of how to read an Annual Report and where to find certain information. The topic of earnings per share is introduced with a description of how this information is used by shareholders. Key financial ratios are also presented in Module 3.
Module 4 begins with the topic of Break-Even Analysis with emphasis on the difference between variable and fixed costs to demonstrate how short-term decisions are made. The concepts of present value and net present value are covered to demonstrate their use in making long-term investments on behalf of the company.
