Learning Outcomes
LO1: Utilise Management and communication skills using problem solving skills around key financial management and decision-making topics such as analysis and interpretation of PLC sets of accounts.
LO2: Demonstrate knowledge of financial management tools for raising finance, managing working capital and calculating optimum capital structures, looking at the relevance and implications to control and decision-making requirements of a business.
Assessment Brief
Role
You have been appointed as a trainee management consultant. You are required to work as part of a group of trainees and prepare a financial analysis of a company. The group must have 3 or 4 members. Members will be determined by the students in class.
Scenario
You are required to use the information provided in the company’s annual accounts, alongside any other information you can gather about the organisation, evaluating it for the benefit of potential investors, who will be invited to attend a short presentation provided by your group.
You have also been asked to critically assess the relevance of annual reports in general and the purpose of producing additional internal management information. They do not know why companies go to all the trouble of producing these quite bulky and often complicated documents.
There will be a peer review which forms part of the allocation of credit towards individual marks.
Task 1 (50%) Presentation and Presentation Notes
As a group you should select a company from the FTSE 250 . You will need to obtain a copy of the most recent annual report/accounts, alongside any other internal management information which will help you analyse the company.
You must advise your tutor of the company selected and the members of your group.
Each group must select a different company.
Prepare a presentation, based on the contents of the annual report and internal management data, to be made to an invited group of potential investors.
The presentation will be for 20 minutes and will be followed by 10 minutes of questions.
You may wish to consider the following:
Working capital requirements
Form /mix of existing finance
Raising of new Finance
Performance of the company
Strategic Planning
Structure of the Business
Change Management Issues
Positioning Statement
Market Share Plans,
Global Competition
Market Challenges and Global economy
Task 2 (40%) Group Report – 1500- 2,000 words
As a group, prepare a short report for the managing director evaluating the content and layout of the annual reports and other financial/management documents produced by PLC’s.
The report needs to include references to academic sources, with an appropriate bibliography in Harvard Format.
You may wish to consider the following:
The user group/s for whom these reports are intended. The purpose of annual reports.
The contents of the report, and the type of information provided. Whether disclosure of the information is voluntary or statutory? How is the information provided – is it
user-friendly?
Internal Management Information
Global competition and effects on financial management of large companies.
You should include any recommendations that you wish to make. Full references are
required.
Task 3 (10%) This is an individual task. Approx. 300 words
For part of your personal development, you are expected to produce a self-reflective report of around 300 words.
Evaluate how you think your group functioned in carrying out the above tasks. Assess the contribution made by yourself and the other members of your group.
This is a self-reflective evaluation.
This must be submitted at the start of the group’s presentation.
