This is the summary of a paper written by Global Corporate College, a partner with CLIMB.
GCC provides effective training on topics that matter most to businesses. In this paper, the relationship between employee competency at every level and financial acumen is explored.
- Successful companies build the financial acumen of their leaders at every level. They do not rely solely on the finance department or senior leaders to understand, interpret and apply financial information. They recognize the value in developing this critical competency for leaders across every function.
- A firm’s financial performance can be described as an accumulation of the individual efforts of its employees. Yet those who typically have the greatest impact on individual efforts, such as supervisors and front line managers, often do not fully understand the financial implications of performance, good or bad.
- A firm’s financial performance can also be described as an accumulation of the decisions of the firm. Supervisors and front line managers directly or indirectly make decisions daily that impact the bottom line.
- In large organizations, it is critical to develop a consistent language to talk about financial acumen and performance. There are a number of ways to describe the skills related to business and financial acumen.
- A solid financial acumen program should focus on developing all 4 of the core skills. Learning objectives may include:
- Understand foundational financial concepts and terms
- Understand the connection between operations and financial performance
- Recognize personal role in the financial performance of the organization
- Incorporate financial impact into decision making process
- Predict financial outcomes given specific inputs
