Finance for Strategic Decision-Making
What Non-Financial Managers Need to Know
Chapter One
Finance and
Corporate Strategy
Finance is a mystery to many general managers. Nonfinancial
executives often view finance (and accounting) as best
left to experts. As a result they sometimes unquestioningly
delegate the numbers aspects of decision making to their finance
colleagues. Finance is, however, too important to be left to the
experts!
When nonfinancial managers do not fully understand what
the numbers represent and the assumptions behind the analysis,
it is all too likely that they will make poor, value-destroying decisions.
That same lack of understanding on general managers'
part can also limit the usefulness of their financial managers' expertise,
since the former may lack clear knowledge of the kind of
information that the latter needs and may not be able to provide
appropriate feedback about the operational aspects of the company.
Contributing to this lack of information interchange is the
fact that financial managers are often viewed as "numbers oriente ... read full excerpt from Finance for Strategic Decision-Making: What Non-Financial Managers Need to Know ebook
