Forecasting, Planning & Budgeting Techniques - with Excel

Forecasting, Planning & Budgeting Techniques - with Excel

This one-day course offers hands-on training surrounding modern-day techniques in Excel that enables us to perform fast and accurate forecasting, planning and budgeting practices as part of the management accounting function. We are introduced to specialist functions that cut-through all of the traditional calculations of the past and bring new and more efficient ways of producing high-quality spreadsheets that facilitate decision-making. All within an easy-to-use format right within Excel!! This course includes how to handle seasonality in a business with many peaks and troughs, and how to make sense of it all. Plus lots to take-away after the course for own use. Who is this for? Finance professionals Junior accountants / Investment advisersFinance and Investment managersData analystsBudget holdersFinancial controllers What will you learn? Forecasting, planning and budgeting as part of the management accounting functionModern quantitative methods used for forecastingIdentifying trends using industry approved techniquesPerform a regression analysisWorking with seasonality (a specialist model for dealing with peaks and troughs)Several approaches to predicting future outcomesBudgeting Planning techniquesThe deterministic planProfit optimisation using a special toolpakSensitivity analysis and dynamic tables to facilitate budgetingIntroduction to stochastic planningScenario modelling on a budget spreadBuilding several calculated budget models into the memoryFunctionsThe forecasting familyCalculating seasonality and time-seriesAVERAGEIFConstrained random number generationConditional/ErrorArray constantsBonus topicsConsolidation options and budget importHow to report high-level info on an overview screenBonus take-away - specialist models for own useHomework topics for further study, including follow-up review and support All exercises and project files used on the course will be available to take home. How will this help your career Become confident in forecasting quickly and accurately, by using tools to make effective decisionsMake sense of equations like y=mx+b and apply them straight awayDevelop quality decision-making models and build a business plan for further detailed planningRun pre-calculated and re-calculated budgeting models and perform sensitivity analysisPlease read the following guidance carefully, which applies only if you are attending this course Virtual Classroom (Online):In addition to the Virtual Classroom (Online) Classroom, you will need to have your own version of Excel open to complete the exercisesIt does prove to be challenging to follow-on with the exercises using only 1 screen as you will need to be regularly switching between open windows. We recommend to either:Extend from a computer to a 2nd screen - please refer to this link for guidance on how to correctly setup a second monitor https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4340331/windows-10-set-up-dual-monitors orUse 2 computers, orUse a tablet for the Virtual Classroom (Online) classroom and a computer for the ExcelPlease note that our courses are based on Excel for Windows and it is recommended that you are using at least Excel 2010 or a later version. MAC users are welcome but please note that there may be some tools and functionality that will differ from what is being presented. The presenter will accommodate for MAC versions on the course.