The First First
Last week I addressed a CIMA evening seminar in Bristol. It was my first ever presentation to a purely professional group and the subject was Management Accounting for Growth.
It was a beautiful evening so I was hoping that we would manage as many as half a dozen in the audience. Imagine my surprise to find 40 had turned out and just about everyone took a brochure home.
The Second First
I have to admit that this was my first ever PowerPoint presentation. We've all suffered 'death by' and we've all winched when there's a technical hitch, as is so often the case. I cracked the first one by only having 17 slides for a 40 minute presentation and to cover the technical side I rehearsed until I was confident it worked. Then 15 minutes before the off, the organiser asked if he could run his PP intro on my computer! What should I do, I could see this messing up my careful arrangements but I allowed the sharing and fortunately all was well.
To my pleasant surprise learning PP was easy and intuitive. Slightly tricky pasting a pdf but I managed to work it out - now I'm ready for more.
The Subject
Well that's not the main point here but in essence: ensure quality, reconciled, prompt information and use it effectively otherwise it's a waste of time and money. Produce Gross Margin information and split it by sector, project, contract, office etc..
In addition key factors are:
•Finance •Cash Flow Forecast •Stock/WIP Control •Credit Management
and model the • Worst case scenario
Contact me for the PP presentation:
Anthony Pilkington FCA
Managing Director, BookCheck Ltd