Business Acumen Certificate

Module 1: Finance for Non-Financial Managers
This session helps you understand finance, the language of business, so you can speak with your peers using the correct terms, concepts and appropriate foundational knowledge. In this one-day program you will develop an understanding of the key financial documents, how to interpret them, and why they are important. Financial terms and calculations will be explained in a way that makes sense for non-financial business professionals. Finally, you will also be challenged to apply what you learn in class by analyzing how your work and your decisions are related to the overall performance of the company.

Module 2: Managing Human Capital
Management of the people side of business is essential to the success of any organization. The role and responsibility of leadership includes retaining and developing their human capital. Employees are more engaged when they are provided with measurable goals as well as constructive and relevant feedback. Additionally, employees who receive appropriate training and professional development that provides the skills needed to perform the work are most likely to be retained. Top leaders are skilled in guiding their employees. This program provides key resources and tools for leaders to communicate their department’s impact on the bottom line from a human resource perspective.

Module 3: Driving Strategy at Any Level
Strategic planning is deciding the most important things that need to get done. Implementation is executing the key activities to achieve your strategic goals. To win in business, you need to master both. Participants leave energized and ready to implement their strategic plans. In this program, you will learn to design a plan your team can implement, create a vision to direct your time and resources, and decide your priorities. Moving to implementation you will learn tools to transform you and your organization, work past procrastination to stay focused on what’s important, and build assessments to gauge where there is still room for improvement.

Module 4: Foundations of Operations Management 
The business practices of turning the organization’s materials and labor into goods and services quite often creates the highest costs. Strong operational management including strategy, planning, implementation, supervision, and continuous improvement effectively become key elements for ensuring your company manages and improves its profitability. This course will introduce the key elements of operations and tools that will help you manage operations to create improved financial performance. You will also learn ways to measure the outcomes of your efforts to create optimal processes.

Professionals at any level who want to increase their business acumen.

Participants will walk away with these skills:

• Knowing financial tools and how to use and interpret these tools
• Understanding how the work you do impacts the bottom line, and making appropriate choices based on this understanding
• Utilizing tools to align operations to your company’s business model and competitive priorities
• Understanding how HR functions affect the bottom line of the organization
• Using guidelines to facilitate writing and implementing a strategic plan that gets results