The Essentials of Budgeting for Non–financial Professionals

Overview/Description
Professionals and functional managers in every department deal with budgets one way or another for providing targets and direction in their day-to-day decision making and control activities. The budget is a formal expression of the plans, goals, and objectives of an organization and familiarity with the essentials of the budget is expected at every level within that organization. This course aims to provide a basic understanding of budgets and their importance in allocating resources and guiding the activities in an organization. It helps you identify the characteristics of an effective budget and the key phases of the budgetary planning process. The course then provides a few examples of different types of budgets and the approaches to budgeting. Finally, the course takes you through variance analysis and how to use a variance report as part of the budgetary control process.

Target Audience
Non-financial professionals who wish to gain understanding or refresh their knowledge of finance and accounting

Prerequisites
Basic knowledge of accounting and finance functions in an organization

Expected Duration (hours)
1.0

Lesson Objectives

The Essentials of Budgeting for Non–financial Professionals

identify the characteristics of an effective budget

sequence the key phases of the budgetary planning process

match budget elements with the type of budget in which they should be recorded

identify key characteristics, advantages, and limitations of two different approaches to budgeting

recognize variances that are worth investigating