This blog post looks at the ways of how FP&A can help entrepreneurs to accomplish their goals. The action that entrepreneurs take is described through financial reports. Financial reports establish a communication process that reveals what entrepreneurs want to do and how they will do it.
Most people will agree that planning is a vital activity for every corporate body. It is often carried out according to a management calendar. Long-range and resource planning tends to take place on an annual basis, forecasting tends to be quarterly, while reporting is monthly driven.
This blog post addresses the acquisition of FP&A skills. People who want to become financial planning and analysis (FP&A) practitioners obtain advice on how to achieve this goal. One piece of advice is to acquire education by taking courses in subjects like accounting, economics, and finance.
What are the basic ingredients of advanced FP&A analytics? Getting the discussion underway the Board’s founder and managing director, Larysa Melnychuk, suggested that it should be proactive, forward-looking, agile, available in real-time, multidimensional and integrated – although these elements are no more than the basic essentials. The combination should be enough to provide the business with good quality information that enables better business decision-making in a timely manner, while also providing unique insights that make a difference to that process.
One of the realities that FP&A professionals need to realize is people tend to be too optimistic in their financial plans. People tend to expect higher revenues, lower expenses, or less time to recover the amounts of their investments. Psychologists label these expectations as optimism bias. As an accountant, I am guided by the conservatism principle.
In this recent interview with GTNews, Larysa Melnychuk sets out the fundamentals of FP&A, its vital role within the organisation, its international aspects and future FP&A trends to watch.