Managers are promoted for competence and then judged on reading financial statements, which nobody trained them for. Most failures in this area of organisational leadership trace back to a conversation someone avoided having. The most reliable predictor of sound the organisational leadership capability is whether anyone reviews it when nothing has gone wrong. Participants gain a clear basis for measuring what reading financial statements has actually achieved. What blocks progress on the organisational leadership discipline is usually unclear ownership rather than unclear intent. It is pitched for practitioners with responsibility for this aspect of organisational leadership, not for observers of it. Content is organised around the decisions practitioners actually face in reading financial statements, not around theory headings. The programme uses small-group work so that each participant's treatment of the organisational leadership capability is examined, not just described. The course ends by identifying what the participant will stop doing to make this area of organisational leadership sustainable.
Expected Learning Outcomes
✓
Judge when to escalate reading financial statements and when to absorb it.
✓
Communicate the purpose of reading financial statements to those who have to comply with it.
✓
Build the internal capability for reading financial statements rather than depending on external support indefinitely.
✓
Protect the team's capacity so reading financial statements is not delivered through exhaustion.
✓
Set direction on reading financial statements that people can act on without further interpretation.
✓
Design a training and briefing approach that sustains competence in reading financial statements.
✓
Set standards on reading financial statements and apply them consistently regardless of who is involved.
Who Should Attend
✓
Team leaders responsible for daily delivery of reading financial statements.
✓
Founders and owner-managers formalising reading financial statements as the organisation grows.
✓
Technical staff being prepared for supervisory responsibility over reading financial statements.
✓
Managers with direct responsibility for reading financial statements within the management team.
✓
High-potential staff being prepared for wider responsibility for reading financial statements.
✓
Department heads and senior managers accountable for reading financial statements.
Course Modules
Open any module to see its sessions and topics.
01
Reading financial statements: the conversations that decide the outcome
2 sessions · 8 points
Session 1Saying the thing about reading financial statements that nobody wants to say
Prepare the response for the most likely failure in reading financial statements.
Define acceptance criteria for reading financial statements in advance.
Set the review point at which reading financial statements will be reconsidered.
State the outcome expected from reading financial statements in a single sentence anyone can repeat.
Session 2The meeting that finally unblocks reading financial statements
Identify your successor for reading financial statements and the gap they need to close.
Record the rationale for each significant choice made about reading financial statements.
Give one piece of specific feedback on reading financial statements within the week.
Recognise publicly one person whose work on reading financial statements went unnoticed.
02
Reading financial statements: influence across functions you do not control
2 sessions · 8 points
Session 1Getting other functions to support reading financial statements
Agree the smallest change to reading financial statements that would be visibly useful.
Prepare how you will respond when reading financial statements is challenged publicly.
Decide the point at which you would escalate reading financial statements.
Set the decision rights on reading financial statements: who decides, who is consulted, who is told.
Session 2Showing that reading financial statements changed something measurable
Collect evidence on the present handling of reading financial statements before proposing changes.
Draft the minimum viable leadership plan for reading financial statements.
Assess the workload reading financial statements adds and what you will remove to make room.
Record what was learned when reading financial statements did not go as planned.
03
Reading financial statements: delegation, trust and accountability
2 sessions · 8 points
Session 1The hard cases in reading financial statements and how to reason about them
