Communicating financial information with impact

Member price in Scotland and Online Live: £335 + VAT
Non-member price in Scotland and Online Live: £395 + VAT

Member price in England: £566 + VAT
Non-member price in England: £666 + VAT

Please note, due to differences regarding external costs, courses outside of Scotland are priced separately. ICAS members are eligible for a discounted price on all courses running in England.

Timing in Scotland and Online Live: 9.30am-4.30pm
Timing in England: 9.30am-5.00pm

Overview

In this day and age, information is abundant. But it is not always useful. Much time (and money!) is spent pulling together information and creating reports but it is debateable how helpful these really are. Key conclusions and recommendations can be lost in high volumes of technical and complex data.

Financial information is typically numerical and the challenge for finance professionals is to translate it into something meaningful that drives decision making. Information is not power unless the messages are clear and convincing. This can be particularly challenging when those on the receiving end are from the non-finance world.

Who should attend

This course is aimed at those who seek to engage and influence through information. Whilst a typical delegate might be from the finance profession, the content may indeed be useful to other professionals whose job involves reporting information on a regular basis.

What you will learn

• Introduction and context setting
  • Common problems with financial information

PART 1 – Communicating financial information in writing

• Understanding your recipient
  • Key questions to ask before you start putting together any communication
  • Stakeholder analysis
• Writing with impact
  • 4 elements of readability
  • Content – organising and explaining findings and recommendations, inductive vs. deductive logic
  • Style – tips for writing more clearly, prose vs. bullets, using tables
  • Design – layout, typography
  • Content – report structures, executive summary
• Presenting numbers
  • Helpful formatting to add clarity and making reading easier and quicker
  • Getting your message across when using numbers
• Using graphs effectively
  • Appropriate use of graphs
  • Tips for adding clarity

PART 2 – Communicating financial information verbally

• Verbally communicating financial information
  • Key challenges and how we might manage them
  • The communication cycle and interference
• Influencing and persuasion
  • Influencing styles
  • Merrill and Reid Social Styles model
  • Advocacy and enquiry
  • Cialdini’s 6 laws of persuasion

Questions?

BPP | Tel: 0330 060 3303 | Email: ldicas@bpp.com