Chapter 8: Accounts: Interpreting Financial Performance

  • Appreciate the importance of effective financial forecasting and planning for a new entrepreneurial venture.
  • Understand the key elements of business accounting as they apply to a new venture.
  • Prepare basic financial statements, including projected profit and loss accounts, balance sheets, and cash flow statements.
  • Appreciate the value of key performance indicators as a way of managing a new venture.
  • Recognise the differences between quantitative and qualitative measures of performance, and how these might be relevant to commercial and social enterprises.
  • Apply relevant principles and techniques of forecasting and planning in order to understand the overall performance of your own venture.