A financial dashboard provides organizations with quick and clear insight into the financial health of the company. It enables management and stakeholders to make well-informed decisions based on up-to-date data.    

Key benefits of a financial dashboard:

• Immediate Insight: The dashboard offers a clear overview of crucial financial data such as revenue, costs, profit, cash flow, and outstanding invoices at a glance.
• Faster Decision-Making: Access to real-time figures allows decisions to be made more efficiently and effectively. This may involve cost control, investment opportunities, or debtor management.
• Risk Identification: Potential financial risks, such as declining revenue or rising costs, are detected promptly. This enables proactive intervention to prevent more significant issues.
• Goal Monitoring: The dashboard facilitates continuous monitoring of financial objectives. Deviations from the plan become immediately visible, allowing for prompt adjustments.
• Efficiency: Collecting individual reports becomes unnecessary. All relevant information is centrally available, saving time and reducing the risk of errors.
• Motivation and Engagement: Regular insights into financial performance encourage teams to work towards improving results.
• Trend Analysis: Analyzing historical data allows for the identification of trends and patterns. This provides valuable insights for strategic planning and future growth opportunities.

This one-day training course teaches you how to construct and use such a dashboard.  It helps executives and users of company accounts to get behind the figures on the face of a balance sheet, profit and loss account and cash flow statement and assess more precisely how a business is performing compared with previous years, in comparison to previous forecasts and competitors.   

The topics covered are:

• What is and why use a financial dashboard? 
• A quick revision of the key financial statements, the balance sheet, income and cash flow statement 
• The nature of ratio analysis
• The profitability ratio
• The liquidity and solvency ratios
• The operating efficiency
• The investor ratios
• The overall performance review
• How to use a financial dashboard as a management steering tool. 

Recommended background

This course applies to anyone in need of assessing their organisational performance or evaluating an external organisation. Basic knowledge of financial statements namely the balance sheet, income statement and cash flow statement is assumed by the participants. 

What you will learn

• You will learn to construct a financial dashboard and use several ratio-analysis instruments to assess financial performance so that the organisation can then design and implement initiatives for increased productivity and profitability.
• You will understand through practical examples how financial analysis assists in managing cash flow, liquidity and the financial structure. 
• You will develop the ability to forecast the future and gain an understanding of how all these pieces of the puzzle fit together.

Course format

This course will be taught using a combination of formal instructions, combined with practical and interactive exercises and case studies used to reinforce the concepts taught in each section of the course.

Practice-based learning and critical engagement is a key theme through all our courses allowing delegates to acquire the needed skills and techniques to be applied as soon as they are learned and developed.

• Julia, Finance Lead: "Fantastic course! It covered everything – from dashboard concepts to construction. I now provide management with sharp insights on profitability and efficiency."
• Thomas, Strategy Consultant: "A brilliant dive into financial dashboards. The logic made sense, and I’m using them to analyze financial structure and investor returns for my clients."
• Marie, CFO: "This course was a game-changer. I learned to build dashboards that clarify profitability and operating efficiency, perfect for boardroom discussions."
• Peter, Operations Head: "Really practical training! The construction tips and logic helped me create dashboards that management relies on for financial and investor insights."
• Klara, Analyst: "Loved this course – it tied dashboard concepts to real outcomes like profitability and structure. I feel ready to support CFOs with solid data."