Business Performance Management
Business Performance Management is the area of business intelligence involved with monitoring and managing an organization's performance, according to key performance indicators (KPIs) such as revenue, return on investment (ROI), overhead, and operational costs. BPM helps businesses make efficient use of their financial, human, material and other resources.
BPM involves consolidation of data from various sources, querying, and analysis of the data, and putting the results into practice. BPM enhances processes by creating better feedback loops. Continuous and real-time reviews help to identify and eliminate problems before they grow. BPM's forecasting abilities help the company take corrective action in time to meet earnings projections. Forecasting is characterized by a high degree of predictability which is put into good use to answer what-if scenarios. BPM is useful in risk analysis and predicting outcomes of merger and acquisition scenarios and coming up with a plan to overcome potential problems.
BPM provides key performance indicators (KPIs) that help companies monitor efficiency of projects and employees against operational targets
Project Planning
Project planning is part of project management, which relates to the use of schedules such as Gantt charts to plan and subsequently report progress within the project environment and the appropriate methods for completing the project are determined. Following this step, the durations for the various tasks necessary to complete the work are listed and grouped into a work breakdown structure. The logical dependencies between tasks are defined using an activity network diagram that enables identification of the critical path. Float or slack time in the schedule can be calculated using project management software. Then the necessary resources can be estimated and costs for each activity can be allocated to each resource, giving the total project cost. At this stage, the project plan may be optimized to achieve the appropriate balance between resource usage and project duration to comply with the project objectives. Once established and agreed, the plan becomes what is known as the baseline. Progress will be measured against the baseline throughout the life of the project. Analyzing progress compared to the baseline is known as earned value management.
Feasibility & Studies
Producing regular business cash flow and projection reports can help your business to keep abreast of your financial position, and can help to provide warning for future problems and issues that may arise.
Other projections, such as balance sheet and profit & loss reports are also useful, especially when attempting to raise finance. Unfortunately, such reports can be very complex to produce, and involve a great deal of expertise. Mistakes can be expensive, and incorrect information can lead to unsuccessful funding requests, or worse still, could result in financial difficulties for you and your business. Based on our previous experiences, we can provide you cash flow forecasts and projection reports satisfying your requirements.
Corporate Finance
The world of business relies upon financing to keep operating, and more importantly, create profits. Methods of financing are numerous, and often complex, but almost every business needs it to survive.
Whether the finance is in the form of a loan, overdraft or simply preferential credit terms, serious considerations need to be made to keep this manageable, and to ensure that the finance chosen suits the business and resolves the initial need for such finance.
The majority of businesses require finance to ease cashflow, which is a serious consideration for the majority of the companies. Cashflow causes many businesses to fail, than any other reason, and balancing the inflow and outflow of funds is an art that many need to master to stay in business.
The firm has the knowledge and resources to advise you and your business on the most appropriate method of finance for you. Our independent teams of advisers can help you to make the most of the finance you choose, and can research the potential return on investment that can be realistically achieved.
Business Amalgamations
Consolidation or amalgamation is the act of merging many things into one. In business, it often refers to the mergers or acquisitions of many smaller companies into much larger ones. The financial accounting term of consolidation refers to the aggregated financial statements of a group company as consolidated account. The taxation term of consolidation refers to the treatment of a group of companies and other entities as one entity for tax purposes.
Under the Halsbury's Laws of England, 'amalgamation' is defined as "a blending together of two or more undertakings into one undertaking, the shareholders of each blending company, becoming, substantially, the shareholders of the blended undertakings. There may be amalgamations, either by transfer of two or more undertakings to a new company, or to the transfer of one or more companies to an existing company". Thus, the two concepts are, substantially, the same. However, the term amalgamation is more common when the organizations being merged are private schools or regiments.
Company Liquidation
Company liquidation can occur voluntarily or by court order where it has been established the company is unable to pay its debts as they fall due.
A liquidator (e.g. a chartered accountant or Official Assignee) is appointed to investigate the company's financial affairs, establish causes of failure, investigate possible offences, and identify and sell assets for the benefit of creditors. Officers of the company are required to assist the liquidator by providing information and answering questions. Failure to cooperate may lead to prosecution by the National Enforcement Unit (NEU).
Accountants or solicitors can provide further information about options for insolvent companies.
Business Valuation
Business valuation is a process and a set of procedures used to estimate the economic value of an owner's interest in a business. Valuation is used by financial market participants to determine the price they are willing to pay or receive to consummate a sale of a business. In addition to estimating the selling price of a business, the same valuation tools are often used by business appraisers to resolve disputes related to estate and gift taxation, divorce litigation, allocate business purchase price among business assets, establish a formula for estimating the value of partners' ownership interest for buy-sell agreements, and many other business and legal purposes.
