POST PANDEMIC PLANNING PARADIGM

The Post Pandemic Planning Paradigm

An eight-week online programme - 2022 Signup now open, for sessions starting September


Are you sick of wasting three months of your year pulling together annual budgets?

...only to see external events make them out of date before you are half-way into the next period?

Yes? 

Then let me transform you into an
   InfoSuperstar Business Team

Your commitment to achieve this?  12 hours over two months and you will be able to replace your dysfunctional annual budgeting cycles with agile, efficient planning using OKR, rolling forecasts and strategically connected metrics

What you will learn:
•    A different way of thinking about how you create plans and drive accountability through your organisation 
•    How to create an implementation plan to save literally hundreds of wasted staff time

What you will achieve:
•    A relevant financial and KPI forecast, which evolves and adapts to changes in the external environment
•    clear accountability for the delivery of objectives to reach every level of your organisation
•    a staff appraisal system which seamlessly integrates with the cascaded organisational goals

How up-to-date is your budget?
Before Coronavirus crisis, nine out of ten of budgets were out of date before the year was half-way gone!

The COVID-19 crisis means that there cannot be a single business or charity that is not having to rework its plans and create new financial forecasts.  Yet the planning processes of many organisations use outdated methods and simply take too long to produce 'budgets'.

So, before your next budgeting cycle join Andy Biggs on the Post Pandemic Planning Paradigm Programme to

•    Learn how to think differently about budgeting and planning
•    Help your organisation develop planning agility
•    Ensure your organisation survives in a pandemic-affected world


More about what the course involves and why you may need it...

Arguably, any organisation that in a post-pandemic world cannot react and re-plan/budget with agility will at best be at a competitive disadvantage, and at worst may have its survival threatened.
 
You don’t want your business to be a dinosaur and fail to adapt fast enough in a post-pandemic world
REMEMBER - MOST DINOSAURS DIDN'T SURVIVE A GLOBAL EXTINCTION EVENT.
 
Organisations cannot continue as they were - they need a better way.

Fortunately, there are thousands of companies who have rejected outdated business planning methods of multi-year strategic planning and annual budgeting which have been the norm for decades. 

These companies have outperformed their peers and increased employee engagement.
This course will help you to join their ranks.

Do you want to learn a different way of thinking about how you create plans and drive accountability through your organisation?  Do you want to create an implementation plan to save literally hundreds of wasted staff time?
 
…In only two-three hours a week over an eight-week period? 

The transformation from this course

After participating in this course you will….

Understand the radical yet simple business goal planning and accountability frameworks used by Google, Intel, The Gates Foundation, and thousands of others, from startups to large companies, to create growth and alignment.

Have clear language and arguments to use, in making a case for change in planning and accountability processes.

Have a finance team that can create flexible, robust forecast spreadsheets that are quick to update and adapt to multiple business scenarios, having gained an understanding of a practical financial modelling blueprint.

Have created an implementation plan for your organisation, to transform it into one that:
  • Always has a financial forecast of the future that reflects the current environment and business response
  • Can re-plan and re-forecast at will without a three-month 'budget process lag'.
  • Has the agility to align organisational objectives.with budget accountability against delivery of the outcome of specific outcomes
  • No longer suffers from political budget inertia, where managers manoeuvre to maintain or increase their cost budget territories
  • Does not need a bolt-on staff appraisal bureaucracy to create timely conversations about performance and employee engagement
BE READY TO LEAD YOUR ORGANISATION OUT OF THE DINOSAUR PLANNING AGE AND INTO POST-PANDEMIC PLANNING PROSPERITY
Would you like to always have a relevant financial and KPI forecast, which evolves and adapts to changes in the external environment?
 
Do you want clear accountability for the delivery of objectives to reach every level of your organisation?
 
Do you want to move towards a staff appraisal system that seamlessly integrates with the cascaded organisational goals?
 
THIS IS ALL POSSIBLE BUT YOUR ORGANISATIONAL MINDSET/PARADIGM HAS TO SHIFT
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And that starts with you, as a business or finance leader
  • Stop investing three months of your life into an annual budget spreadsheet tsunami. 
  • Understand the value of rolling quarterly forecasting and how to implement it.
  • Build smart, flexible forecast spreadsheets. Learn best practice design principles alongside learning how to apply Excel data tools like Queries and Connections
  • Align management accounting more closely with organisational strategic goals.
  • Learn about the alternative VISMAP method of visual strategy mapping to create targets without needing to use complex financial models.
  • Learn techniques to shorten your reporting cycles, to free up more time to focus on the future.
  • Ensure that projects are formulated and signed off only when needed by the organisation's Objective plan.  Remove the dependency of once-a-year budget signoff which inevitably leads to lack of proper scrutiny and misalignment of goals.
  • Increase your ability to focus and deliver by learning how to apply the OKR techniques into your personal plans.
  • Learn alongside your Business Leaders, so that you will have alignment to implement

  • Supercharge your existing vision and mission statements - Learn how to harness the power of OKR to simplify your vision into bite-sized, actionable goals that can easily be cascaded into departmental initiatives.
  • Understand the value of regular re-targeting of objectives.
  • Learn the language to multiply employee engagement in creating Key Result targets that staff are committed to deliver.
  • Learn about the alternative VISMAP method of visual strategy mapping to create targets without needing to use complex financial models.
  • Ensure that projects are formulated and signed off only when needed by the organisation's Objective plan.  Remove the dependency of once-a-year budget signoff which inevitably leads to lack of proper scrutiny and misalignment of goals.
  • Learn more about how to leverage the analytical skills of your finance team, and how to support them to become more future-forecast centric.
  • Increase your ability to focus and deliver by learning how to apply the OKR techniques into your personal plans.
  • Learn alongside your Finance Leaders, so that you will have alignment to implement

What's different about this course?

Many courses teach you 'how to' do tasks better.  This course equips you to 'think better', and then helps you to implement a pragmatic solution to replace the inefficiencies of annual budgeting with a simple, flexible and proven framework.
 
It’s taught live online (with replays available), so that interactive Q&A and online discussion between sessions can influence the way content adapts to the course participants.
 
It includes two tracks of content, one designed for business leaders (CEOs / MDs / Commercial Directors), the other for finance professionals (Finance Directors / Financial Controllers).  This enables the concepts to be communicated in relevant language to each group, without business leaders having to translate 'finance-speak' - ideal for solopreneurs and smaller organisations.
 
If both business and finance leaders from the same organisation participate, the complimentary content is designed to maximise the chance of successful implementation by creating mutual understanding around a common paradigm.
 
The programme has been created and is delivered by an experienced Business Leader and Chartered Accountant, Andy Biggs MA FCA BFP,  who has successfully applied many of the principles contained in the course in his career. He understands the demands of both the CEO and CFO roles, having walked in both sets of shoes over the course of his career.
 
Complementing the learning element of the programme are 1-2-1 coaching/mentoring sessions, as well as an additional FREE benefit of a group mastermind  session where you can share your challenges and benefit from the wisdom of other course participants in solving them – just as your wisdom and experience will help solve theirs.
 
BONUS CONTENT
The final course session will be an interactive mastermind / implementation Zoom Q&A, broken down in to small groups so that you can sharpen your plans and hold yourself accountable to others in how you are going to deliver change in your organisation.

EXTRA OPTION
If you have people from your organisation attending both tracks, then you can optionally book an additional three-hour implementation workshop, to be held virtually over Zoom or your preferred video-conferencing app.
Andy is a former CEO and CFO with 30 years' experience of working in and with commercial and non-profit organisations.
 
Andy is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants, has a master's degree from Durham Business School and is an all-round superstar thinker, not just a dashboard or spreadsheet expert.  Sometimes he struggles to be modest, but these are words from others...
 
His career history includes leading financial planning at Attends Healthcare through multiple ownership cycles. In 2012, as CFO, he oversaw the €180 million sale to Domtar - a deal which won "Turnaround of the Decade" Award at the 2018 Turnaround, Restructuring and Insolvency Awards.
 
Since 2013 he had operated as an independent consultant / non-executive director, including acting as interim CEO of fair trade pioneer Traidcraft from 2015-16.
 
When it comes to business information, he is an unconventional visionary with a conventional background. 

He is on a mission to equip Business Leaders and Finance Professionals to be superstar performers by intelligently and efficiently connecting metrics with strategy, without 'death by a thousand spreadsheets'.

What do you get / Course Curriculum Plan

Finance Leader Track
Week 1 - Overview and fact finding
Recommended reading and setup
Course participant onboarding and learning goals
The importance of high level goals and vision – a new perspective on your organisation’s purpose

Week 2 - Objectives and Key Results ("OKRs")
Deep dive into OKR concepts
Start to develop what your OKRs are - both organisationally and as a finance team
 
Week 3 - Beyond Budgeting – Rolling Quarterly Forecasts and VISMAP Visual Strategy Mapping
Practical ideas for implementation.
Debunking the myth of annual budgeting and implementing rolling quarterly forecasting
Practical ideas about setting budgets at a project or departmental activity level

Week 4 - Freeing up time
Streamlining the reporting of actuals and creating management reports. Practical suggestions for a process for mapping reporting processes and eliminating waste
 
Week 5 - Forecast Models
Spreadsheet time -
Guidelines for a good forecast model
Downloadable demo of a suggested forecast model format that illustrates the above principles
 
Week 6 - Implementation tips
Bringing it all together
Dealing with cultural inertia
Creating your own organisational plan
 
Week 7 - Using OKRs to manage everything you do
If the secret of OKR releases focus in to the organisation, it should work for life!
Andy will explain how he uses it to increase his personal effectiveness in all areas of life
 
Week 8 - Implementation Masterclass  / Mastermind Coaching / Q&A
Test and hone your implementation plans with Andy and your course peers (breakout into small groups)
Business Leader Track
Week 1 - Overview and fact finding
Recommended reading and setup
Course participant onboarding and learning goals
Debunking the myth of annual budgeting as a tool
The importance of high level goals and vision – a new perspective on your organisation’s purpose
 
Week 2 - Objectives and Key Results ("OKRs")
Deep dive into OKR concepts
Start to develop what your OKRs are as an organisation
 
Week 3 – Getting the right commercial agenda – VISMAP Visual Strategy Mapping
Introduction to the VISMAP method of fast-tracking your commercial decision making for your product/service portfolio.
Clarifying your OKRs based upon sound analysis of the product and market opportunties before you.

Week 4 – Leadership while Implementing rolling quarterly forecasting
Working out how to influence your team to give you the information want when you want it. Considering how information is communicated and supporting your finance team to implement rolling quarterly forecasts.
 
Week 5 - Scenario Planning and risk
How to think flexibly about ranges of options and how to communicate this to your finance team.
A downloadable demo of a suggested forecast model format that illustrates the above principles
 
Week 6 - Implementation tips
Bringing it all together
Dealing with cultural inertia
Creating your own organisational plan
 
Week 7 - Using OKRs to manage everything you do
If the secret of OKR releases focus into the organisation, it should work for life! Andy will explain how he uses it to increase his personal effectiveness in all areas of life
 
Week 8 - Implementation Masterclass  / Mastermind Coaching / Q&A
Test and hone your implementation plans with Andy and your course peers (breakout into small groups)

Q&A


When will the sessions happen?

The course is designed to be accessed by remote learning at a time of your choosing.


However, the course content will be built up week by week based upon live sessions, which will be available on replay shortly after broadcast, both in the Facebook Group and on an evergreen training portal.


Sessions will be a 90-minute slot on a weekday morning, starting at 9.30am


The first session is scheduled for Thursday 8th September 2022, but will be confirmed to match the diaries of everyone who signs up.


What will a session look like?

Each session will be taught in a webinar format, with live video streamed to a closed Facebook Group.  This part of the session will be recorded and available on replay automatically, for anyone who missed the session or who wants to watch again.

After a welcome, Andy will teach content for roughly one hour. A Live chat feature will be available for some degree of interaction.

There will then be a 30-minute Q&A follow up hosted on Zoom.  This will be recorded also, and uploaded separately alongside the main session.


What happens if I miss a 'live' session?

No problem - the live session will be available for you to watch later.  All you will miss is the ability to ask questions live. 


The sessions will build on each other to some extent, but prior to the implementation weeks, missed sessions could be accessed out of order if your need to catch-up.


Do I need to sign up to Facebook to participate?

No - by signing up to the course, you get 'lifetime'* access to the content on a Training portal (Thinkific) and can participate fully in the learning.

* for as long as that training portal is able to host this content

The Facebook group will however give you bonus access to responsive discussion during the course.  Facebook is being used because it offers 'free' closed discussion (course participants only) that could not be provided elsewhere without making the course more expensive.


Is the above curriculum fixed?

Yes and No.  The outline of materials has been designed to create a comprehensive learning outcome. However, the advantage of teaching the course live means that it will be possible to adapt content based upon the questions and challenges that participants bring. In short - you have the opportunity to get customised learning!

How much does this all cost?

That's a good question, particularly if you're an accountant!  

Perhaps the first question you have to ask however is:

"How much will it cost my organisation if we don’t change how we plan, forecast or budget?"
  • How many hours will you waste on the next budget cycle, only to find the numbers are superseded by events?
  • How many opportunities will you miss or lose to faster, more agile competitors, while you’re collating and creating budgets for signoff?
  • How can you manage the cost to properly determine departmental budgets:
EITHER
How much money will be wasted in departments because the budget process just mandates a % change from previous year.?
OR 
How much time (and therefore money) will it take to get departmental budgets worked out using a zero base method, in response to the changing post-pandemic world?
 
This course is a relatively small investment to set you on the right path!




Let's assume that to pull a budget together, you need five senior mid-level people providing commercial thought input, creating, filling-in and collating spreadsheets, and then writing papers and presentations. 

Assume they work on this for one-third of their time for three months.
If they have an average salary cost of £50,000, that amounts to a headcount cost of around £21,000. 

 -All to create numbers that are potentially not useful for very long.

PAYMENT - CLICK ON ANY OF THE BUTTONS ABOVE TO PAY BY DEBIT/CREDIT CARD
Payment can be made directly with a credit card using the buttons on this page (VAT Invoice will be provided separately) , or we can send your organisation an invoice, for payment within 14 days.

Once your payment has been received, we can start to send you the pre-course welcome materials and add you to the closed Facebook group where we will stream content and start discussions!


Course signups close at midnight on Tuesday 30th August 2022 - Don't miss out!

And... the no-risk guarantee!
We're confident you're going to find plenty of food for thought and action on this course.

However, if when we've got to the end of the programme, you can honestly say that you've not learned anything you can implement, we will refund your course fee.  No quibble.

So - you have no financial risk - yet another reason to sign up!

"I'm passionate about helping organisations and their leaders to evolve and prosper.  Please come and join me on the programme and together, let’s increase your chance of success in a post-pandemic world."

Andy Biggs

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