Financial Skills: Finance for HR professionals

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Course Overview

It is generally accepted that an effective Human Resources department is an indispensable part of the success of any business. While you are perfectly at ease dealing with the people aspects of your role, you may well experience some misgivings when it comes to crossing functional boundaries into the finance area. If you are to contribute to the future of your organisation on the same basis as other functional heads, you must develop the ability to use financial information with the same degree of confidence as they do.

You can't become an accountant overnight, but you can learn how financial cases are put together, how to think like the Finance Director and how HR adds value to the business in only two days. No prior knowledge of finance is assumed, and every effort has been made to make the content of this programme as accessible and relevant as possible. There is no other course currently available in the UK offering a similar service to the HR professional.

Croner Training brings to this seminar the same authoritative content and attention to detail that characterises its published materials. Presented by an exceptional speaker who has extensive experience in training non-financial specialists, 'Finance skills for HR professionals' will give you the boost you need to deal with numbers confidently.

Audience

• Human resources professionals
• Personnel officers, managers and directors

The seminar is relevant for those working in the private sector, the public sector and not for profit organisations.

Skills Gained

After attending this seminar you will be able to:

• 1. Prepare HR budgets with more depth and meaning
• 2. Review management information with a higher level insight
• 3. Communicate with the finance function in their language
• 4. Challenge numbers and know what key questions to ask about them
• 5. Contribute with confidence to board discussions about financial performance
• 6. Assess performance measurement and reward systems on their financial merits
• 7. Present clear financial cases for HR initiatives
• 8. Read the financial press with enthusiasm and a desire to understand what is happening in your market
• 9. Most importantly, state clearly to your board how HR adds real and significant financial value to the organisation

Course Outline

The balance sheet image - seeing the real business behind the numbers

• Getting a feel for the different types of assets
• Looking at liabilities and the risks attached to each
• How to assess the balance sheet strength and the management capability
• A simple, structured approach to interpretation of the numbers
• Key accounting language - gearing and liquidity

Income and expenditure, profit and loss - developing the confidence to challenge the numbers

• How to get started - which numbers to look at first
• Learning to ask the right questions rather than expect answers from the numbers
• Key accounting language - accruals, capital vs revenue, gross profit and ratios: how to judge performance quickly and intuitively
• Checking the cash - how to spot the danger signs in business

The budget challenge - gaining peace of through doing it properly

• The language of budget planning - zero based, incremental, cost codes; how to understand what the finance function expects of you
• Your 'monthly financial reports' - how to understand where accounts get those numbers from and how to explain variance
• How to learn from experience and reforecast with improved vision

How corporate governance affects every budget holders' role and responsibilities

The benefits of success - measuring and rewarding employee performance on financial merit

• Performance ratios - ROI, ROCE, EVA - and how to avoid the pitfalls in financial incentive schemes
• A more rounded approach to measuring performance - The Balanced Scorecard
• The taxation of salaries and benefits - update and efficiency check
• Understanding the real financial issues with pension schemes

The City - seeing the bigger financial picture

• How to read the financial pages: yields, price/earnings ratios, market capitalisation
• What influences share prices and what is meant by terms such as 'equity' and 'shareholder value'?
• Human capital value and HR accountability
• The annual report and the new operating and financial review - a brochure for all stakeholders: what the accounts reveal about a company's image, social responsibility and pension fund

Developing a business case for HR - getting approval HR investments

• How to think like the finance director
• The culture of value-based organisations
• The key drivers of value - future cash flows, relevant and irrelevant costs
• Understanding net present value and how investment decisions are made
• The role of HR in successful financial decision making

Financial Skills: Finance for HR professionals / F-HR