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We Mean Business™...a Nano MBA
A one-day tutorial in business accumen.

We Mean Business™ helps managers and employees understand broad business concepts and how they can impact corporate performance. The course is built on the business link between markets, innovation, financing, and individual action. Specifically, participants will…

  • Identify key market forces that impact your business.
  • Explain the role of innovation and product development.
  • Describe how a company finances its operations.
  • Understand the 3 basic financial reporting tools used to monitor financial performance.
  • Describe and apply the concepts used in capital budgeting, payback, and financial decision making.
  • Describe how individual actions impact business results.
  • Create a plan that will impact the bottom-line.

Participants learn and practice these concepts in the context of your business, and apply them to their own units. The result is a clear understanding of how to improve their own performance and that of their unit and team. They go back to their jobs with new knowledge and a plan for direct performance improvement that will impact the bottom-line.

Course Overview

1. Markets Lead to Change How markets lead innovation and product development. 5 questions for evaluating market opportunity.
Application: Identify market forces and how your business is responding.

2. Change Requires Innovation Product Life Cycle. Market, technology and product curves. Innovation leads to products that require new business models which require capital.

3. Innovation Requires Capital Cash cycle: Financing, Investing, Operations, Return. Two ways to get capital: Debt and Equity.

4. Capital Requires Management & Financial Reports Investors are interested in performance.
Application: Build a Balance Sheet.
Application: Build an Income Statement.
  • Revenue
  • Variable and fixed costs
  • Depreciation
  • What do you do with Net Income
  • Earnings per Share
  • Break Even Analysis
Application: Cash Flows.
  • Sources and uses
  • Cash flow from operations, investing, financing
  • Cash flow statement
  • Discussion: What is impact of cash on…ex: slow receivables; slow payables; poor forecasting; poor quality; inventory

5. How do you Impact Net Income What does this mean for you? How you and your team can impact net income (increase shareholder value).
Application: Propose 3 ways your team can impact Net Income.
Creating the Justification for your Action
  • Create an Financial Justification
  • Create Discounted Cash flow (DCF)
  • Figuring WACC
  • Do a Sensitivity Analysis
Application: DCF for one of your actions.
Next steps: Turn your project into results.