Beyond Budgeting and Financial Planning Training Course

Duration 5 days 10 modules · 33 contact hours
Level Intermediate Certificate on completion
Who attends Finance Managers, FP&A Managers and others
Fee from USD 1,100 KSh 95,000 for Kenyan organisations
Where 52 cities + online See dates by city
Next start 9 Nov 2026 Course code SD-FM-084

Before you join: Participants should understand core management accounting concepts, including budgets, actual-versus-budget variance analysis, income statements, cash flow and basic forecasting.

Dates & prices

Two start dates a month in every city, and live online on weekdays or weekends. Fees are per participant; classroom fees include tuition, materials, lunch and refreshments, and the certificate.

Suggest a date or city

Showing the next six months. Later dates, other cities and private deliveries for your team are available on request.

Course overview

Annual budgets often become outdated before the first quarter closes. Fixed targets can encourage sandbagging, delayed decisions and spending against budget rather than against current priorities. Finance teams need planning systems that respond to changing demand, costs, funding conditions and operational risks while maintaining financial control, accountability and credible performance reporting.

This course examines how to move from a fixed annual budget cycle towards adaptive financial planning. Participants learn the Beyond Budgeting principles, rolling forecasts, driver-based planning, relative performance measures, dynamic resource allocation and decentralised decision rights. They assess which elements of an existing budgeting process should be retained, simplified or replaced, and learn to connect planning with strategy, cash management, operational capacity and management reporting.

Teaching combines focused briefings with financial planning cases, forecast-building workshops, group discussions and decision simulations. Participants work with realistic scenarios involving a bank branch network, a public-sector service programme, a manufacturing business and a grant-funded NGO. Each participant leaves with a Beyond Budgeting implementation blueprint, including a planning maturity assessment, forecast calendar, key business drivers, governance design and first-stage transition actions.

The course suits finance professionals and operational managers who contribute to budgets, forecasts, performance reviews or resource-allocation decisions. It is particularly relevant where leaders require more frequent insight, faster reprioritisation and greater accountability than an annual budget can provide.

What you will be able to do

  • Assess annual budgeting weaknesses using a planning maturity diagnostic
  • Apply the BBRT 12 principles to financial planning design
  • Build rolling forecasts using operational and financial value drivers
  • Design relative targets and performance measures without fixed budget contracts
  • Create dynamic resource-allocation rules linked to strategic priorities
  • Develop forecast governance, accountability and decision-rights arrangements
  • Construct management reporting packs for forecast-based performance reviews
  • Produce a phased Beyond Budgeting implementation blueprint

Benefits of attending

For you

  • Replace static budget discussions with driver-based forecast conversations
  • Build credible rolling forecasts for management and board reporting
  • Challenge budgetary gaming using relative targets and transparent measures
  • Lead planning redesign discussions with finance and operational stakeholders
  • Prepare a practical transition plan for a less budget-dependent planning process

For your organisation

  • Shorten planning response times when demand, costs or priorities change
  • Improve forecast accuracy through operational drivers and frequent updates
  • Reduce low-value budget negotiation and annual planning administration
  • Align resource decisions with current strategy, capacity and cash conditions
  • Strengthen accountability through clearer decision rights and performance measures

Course modules

10 modules over 5 days

Participants can diagnose where a fixed annual budget obstructs planning, control and performance decisions.

  • Annual budget purposes separated into planning, target setting and resource allocation
  • Budgetary gaming, sandbagging and spend-it-or-lose-it behaviour identified
  • Fixed targets compared with relative performance measures and external benchmarks
  • Planning maturity diagnostic applied to current budgeting processes
  • Beyond Budgeting origins and the BBRT 12 principles
  • Financial control requirements distinguished from annual budget commitments

Participants can explain the management model and design choices underlying Beyond Budgeting.

  • BBRT leadership principles: purpose, values, transparency and customer focus
  • Management principles: rhythm, autonomy, accountability, goals and rewards
  • Dynamic management processes replacing fixed annual budget contracts
  • Relative goals set against peers, competitors or prior performance
  • Decision rights mapped using RAPID accountability roles
  • Trust-based controls balanced with financial authority limits

Participants can connect strategic priorities to adaptable financial and operational planning.

  • Strategy maps translate strategic themes into measurable value drivers
  • Balanced Scorecard objectives linked to financial and non-financial indicators
  • Scenario planning tests alternative demand, price and cost assumptions
  • PESTLE assumptions converted into planning risks and trigger points
  • Capacity constraints incorporated into strategic resource choices
  • Strategic initiatives separated from recurring operating expenditure

Participants can build planning models from the operational drivers that determine financial results.

  • Revenue bridges built from volume, price, mix and retention drivers
  • Cost drivers distinguish fixed, variable, step-fixed and discretionary expenditure
  • Activity-Based Costing links operational activity to resource consumption
  • Headcount plans connect staffing levels, grades, vacancies and payroll
  • Working capital drivers model receivables, inventory, payables and cash conversion
  • Assumption registers record owners, sources, ranges and review dates

Participants can design rolling forecasts with appropriate horizons, frequency and data ownership.

  • Rolling forecast horizons selected for business volatility and decision lead times
  • Monthly, quarterly and event-driven forecast update cycles compared
  • 13-week rolling cash forecast built from receipts, payroll and supplier data
  • Forecast versions controlled through baseline, latest estimate and scenario labels
  • Top-down guidance reconciled with bottom-up operating forecasts
  • Forecast calendars assign submission dates, review gates and approvals

Participants can assess forecast reliability and turn variances into management action.

  • Forecast accuracy measured using mean absolute percentage error
  • Bias analysis identifies consistently optimistic or conservative forecasting patterns
  • Price, volume, mix and efficiency variances explained systematically
  • Variance bridges reconcile prior forecast, actual results and revised outlook
  • Materiality thresholds focus management attention on decision-relevant deviations
  • Root cause analysis separates data errors from operational performance issues

Participants can create resource-allocation methods that respond to current priorities and constraints.

  • Funding envelopes set guardrails without departmental annual spending limits
  • Stage-gate funding releases investment against evidence and delivery milestones
  • Zero-based review challenges discretionary cost commitments and legacy activities
  • Portfolio matrices rank initiatives by strategic value, risk and capacity
  • Contingency reserves governed through defined triggers and approval rights
  • Capital and operating decisions linked through total cost of ownership

Participants can design performance measures that reduce reliance on fixed budget targets.

  • Relative performance assessed against peer groups and market reference points
  • Key performance indicators combine outcomes, drivers, risks and service measures
  • Balanced scorecards prevent financial targets dominating management decisions
  • Threshold, target and stretch ranges replace single-point commitments
  • Team rewards assessed using relative, qualitative and multi-period evidence
  • Performance dialogues separate learning reviews from reward decisions

Participants can establish governance and reporting arrangements for adaptive financial planning.

  • Planning governance defines forecast ownership, challenge roles and escalation routes
  • Delegated authority matrices align spending decisions with risk appetite
  • Management reporting distinguishes performance, forecast, cash and risk views
  • Exception reports highlight trigger breaches, emerging risks and required decisions
  • Data lineage documents source systems, transformations and reporting ownership
  • Internal control activities maintained through approvals, reconciliations and audit trails

Participants can prepare a phased plan for introducing Beyond Budgeting practices.

  • Current-state assessment identifies process pain points, dependencies and quick wins
  • Pilot scope selected using volatility, leadership support and data readiness
  • Stakeholder mapping identifies sponsors, resisters, users and decision makers
  • Change communications explain new planning rhythms, roles and expectations
  • Implementation milestones sequence model design, testing, rollout and review
  • Benefits tracking measures cycle time, forecast quality and decision speed

Exercises and examples are adapted to each cohort's sectors and roles.

What you take back to work

  1. Beyond Budgeting planning maturity diagnostic
  2. Driver-based rolling forecast model template
  3. Forecast governance and calendar template
  4. Relative performance measure design sheet
  5. Dynamic resource-allocation decision framework
  6. Phased Beyond Budgeting implementation blueprint

Who should attend

  • Finance Managers — responsible for budgeting, forecasting and management reporting
  • FP&A Managers — redesigning planning cycles and improving forecast quality
  • Financial Controllers — strengthening financial control beyond annual budget limits
  • Business Unit Managers — making resource and performance decisions from current forecasts
  • Treasury Managers — connecting rolling forecasts with liquidity and funding requirements
  • Programme Managers — managing changing priorities, costs and delivery commitments

Skills and tools covered

Rolling forecast designDriver-based planningRelative performance measurementResource allocation governanceForecast variance analysisPlanning transformation

Tools and standards

BBRT 12 Principles, Balanced Scorecard, RAPID decision rights, Activity-Based Costing

How the course runs

Training methodology

The course uses short instructor briefings to introduce planning methods, governance choices and implementation risks. Participants analyse planning failures, build forecast structures from operating data and compare fixed-budget controls with adaptive alternatives. Group case work examines decision rights, target setting and resource allocation under changing conditions. Simulations test responses to demand shocks, cost pressures and funding constraints. Facilitated application planning helps participants translate the methods into actions for their own planning cycle, reporting calendar and stakeholder groups.

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should understand core management accounting concepts, including budgets, actual-versus-budget variance analysis, income statements, cash flow and basic forecasting. Experience preparing departmental budgets, contributing planning assumptions or reviewing monthly management reports is helpful. Participants should be comfortable interpreting spreadsheet-based financial information and discussing operational drivers with non-finance colleagues. Advanced financial modelling, programming, specialist planning software and prior knowledge of Beyond Budgeting are not required. The course focuses on planning design, governance and practical implementation rather than statutory accounting or investment appraisal.

A typical training day

08:30 – 10:30First session
10:30 – 10:45Refreshment break
10:45 – 12:30Second session
12:30 – 13:30Lunch and networking
13:30 – 15:00Third session
15:00 – 15:15Refreshment break
15:15 – 16:30Workshop and daily review

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in East Africa Time, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

  • Instruction by a practitioner facilitator
  • Full course workbook and materials
  • Exercise files, templates and case studies
  • Refreshments and lunch on classroom deliveries
  • Certificate of completion
  • Post-course application plan

Frequently asked questions

You should understand basic budgeting, forecasting and management reporting. Experience contributing to a budget or reviewing financial performance is useful, but prior exposure to Beyond Budgeting is not required.

Bring a laptop if possible, along with a current budget template, forecast calendar or reporting pack if your employer permits. These materials can help you relate the methods to your own planning process, but they are not mandatory.

It is designed for finance, FP&A, control, treasury and operational managers involved in planning or resource decisions. It also suits transformation leads tasked with reducing the burden of annual budgeting.

Traditional budgeting courses focus on preparing annual budgets, while financial modelling courses focus on spreadsheet construction. This course concentrates on redesigning planning, forecasting, target setting, resource allocation and governance beyond fixed annual budget contracts.

Participants can begin by assessing their existing planning process, identifying priority drivers and introducing a rolling forecast pilot. The implementation blueprint provides a structured starting point for discussions with finance leaders and business stakeholders.

The five days provide about 32.5 contact hours, delivered from 08:30 to 16:30 each day. Time is divided between instructor input, case analysis, planning-model work, group discussion, simulations and implementation planning.

Questions about this course?

Ask about dates, fees, group bookings or running it for your team. Our training team replies by email.

Ask on WhatsApp info@skillsetdevelopment.com

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