Finance affects every professional, even if you never work in a finance department.

Every business decision eventually has a financial consequence.You may not deal with finance, but your decisions continuously affect finance.

What is this course about?

Finance for Non-Finance Professionals is designed to help managers, executives, employees, entrepreneurs and students understand the essential financial concepts that influence businesses, investments and the wider economy without requiring a background in accounting or finance.

One of the most important skills for any professional is the ability to understand the basic financial health of an organisation.

You will therefore learn how to interpret the three principal financial statements:

The Balance Sheet : What does the company own, what does it owe, and how is the business financed?

The Profit and Loss Statement or Income Statement: Is the company earning a profit or making a loss, and where is that profit coming from?

The Cash Flow Statement: Where is cash coming from, where is it going, and is the business actually generating cash?

The emphasis throughout is on understanding rather than accounting procedures.

You do not need to prepare financial statements. But as a manager, employee, entrepreneur or investor, you should be able to read them, understand the broad picture and recognise important financial signals.

Why should a non-finance professional learn finance?

Because finance connects almost every important business decision.

And senior management must continuously decide where limited resources should be deployed to create maximum sustainable value.

Understanding finance therefore enables you to participate more confidently in business discussions and appreciate the financial consequences of decisions made within your own function.