Accounting, Decision Making & Financial Communication

Course Category : Finance

This programme enables professionals to use accounting and financial information to support sound decision-making and clear financial communication across the organisation.
Duration: 5 Days
Level: Intermediate

Introduction

Accounting is often described as the language of business, yet many managers and executives have not fully developed fluency in this language. This course is designed to bridge that gap by presenting financial accounting concepts in a structured, decision-oriented way, focusing on how financial information can be used to support planning, control, and communication.
Participants will explore the relationships between the income statement, balance sheet, and cash flow statement, and learn how these reports can be translated into meaningful insights for performance evaluation and strategic decision-making. The programme also emphasises budgeting, cost behaviour, and value creation, while building strong financial communication skills to improve dialogue between finance professionals and other functions. Real-life examples and case studies are used throughout to ensure direct applicability in the workplace..

Targeted Specializations

Members of operational management teams
Managers responsible for divisional performance
Managers in support functions
Consultants advising on systems and operations
Senior staff from any corporate department

Targeted Skills

Interpreting financial statements and their interrelationships
Using financial information for managerial decisions
Understanding and working with budgets and cash flows
Analysing cost behaviour and cost–volume–profit relationships
Designing and clarifying financial KPIs
Enhancing financial communication across functions
Evaluating profitability, liquidity, and leverage
Linking accounting information to strategy and value creation

Expected Outcomes

Understand the structure and linkages of the main financial statements.
Use financial statements to evaluate organisational financial performance.
Apply discounted cash flow (DCF) techniques in decision-making.
Analyse how profit margin, asset utilisation, and leverage affect investor returns.
Understand the budgeting process and its role in planning and performance evaluation.
Interpret cost behaviour and its impact on managerial decisions.
Recognise the need for and methods of overhead allocation.
Communicate and challenge financial information more effectively.

Training Topics Index

Understanding income statements in plain language
Reading the balance sheet as a snapshot of financial position
Interpreting cash flow statements for day-to-day decisions
Typical management questions and how financials answer them
Practical exercises linking figures to operational reality

Types of management decisions that require financial input
Simple cost behaviour concepts (fixed vs variable)
Cost–Volume–Profit (CVP) analysis explained
Break-even point and margin of safety
Case-based decisions. Product continuation, special orders, basic pricing

Why managers need budgets, not just year-end reports
Translating operational plans into budget numbers
Budgets as a negotiation and alignment tool between finance and operations
Reading and discussing budget variances without heavy jargon
Using budgets to clarify responsibility and performance expectations

Designing simple, meaningful financial KPIs
Linking KPIs to strategy, not only to historic results
Building management dashboards (traffic lights, trends, exceptions)
Presenting numbers in management meetings (5-minute story)
Common mistakes in financial presentations and how to avoid them

Moving from “number reporting” to “insight communication”
Tailoring depth of detail to different audiences
Handling difficult questions and challenges to the numbers
Writing concise management-oriented financial reports
Workshop. Turning a technical report into a compelling business message

Course Features

Modern and practical content
Real-world examples and leadership exercises
Pre- and post-course assessments to measure impact
Accredited certificate with QR code verification

Accounting, Decision Making & Financial Communication