Business owners often overlook financial matters, especially when they get busy running their company. But neglecting these details can wreak havoc on your finances and leave you vulnerable.
Financial planning has become mainstream in recent years because it helps companies determine whether they're financially prepared for growth, manage their budgets effectively, stay out of debt, and plan for future risks and opportunities. Many businesses now rely on professional accountants to manage their finances at every stage of their growth.
In the business world, Financial Planning is the process of estimating the capital required in your business. It is the process of framing financial matters in relation to procurement, investment and administration of funds of an enterprise.
"According to a Standard & Poor's worldwide financial literacy survey, only 24% of Indians are economically savvy. It implies that 76% of our population in India is uninformed on financial literacy principles. There is also our unwavering belief in real estate and gold."
However, only some businesses embrace the concept fully, because they realize its importance and value.
Every business owner should develop a comprehensive financial plan before starting his/her venture. The aim isn't just saving money or avoiding losses – rather, it's ensuring long term success.
It's critical to develop a sound financial strategy that aligns with your long term goals. Many businesses fail after years of sustained growth due to lack of proper financial planning. Let's see why it's necessary for businesses.
Reasons why financial planning in business is important?
1. Income Management
Financial planning is necessary because it can help you manage your money. It can also help you in developing a strategy that will help you in calculating monthly expenses. It can also help you figure out how much money you'll need for taxes and how much money you'll be able to save from the specified amount.
2. Make your cash flow easy
Income growth leads to an increase in overall earnings. Financial planning is important for the daily lifestyle. You can quickly find activities that require more attention by carefully analyzing your spending habits and monthly budgeting.
This type of expenditure can help you in keeping track of your working capital, reducing overhead costs, and ultimately increasing your overall capital.
3. Better Investment
A good financial plan considers your specific situation, risk tolerance, and long-term goals. Financial planning is the creation and planning of financial resources for the future.
4. Enhanced ROI
Financial decisions, risk assessments, cash management, and goal planning are important parts of financial planning. Financial planning lets you create an investment strategy that takes into account your goals, and available liquidity, allowing you to increase the return on your ROI portfolio.
5 Benefits of Financial Planning for Businesses
1. Clear company goals you will get to know how much you have invested in a particular product, or how you are going to get back from the market.
2. A carefully planned and thoroughly thought-out budget helps a business to make financial decisions and allocate money efficiently for different projects.
3. A financial plan helps companies gain a deeper insight into their funds, making it easy to see the bigger picture. A financial plan enables you to break down complicated budgets into smaller steps.
4. When it comes to growing a business, it’s essential to measure your progress continuously. Hence, you’re more aware of where your business is going.
5. A good financial plan also allows for proper use of capital including tangible and intangible assets. A proper financial plan ensures that the business is able to access the latest technology and machinery as required.
Types of Financial Planning
Financial planning services play a very important role for any business. The formulation of this planning is done in two ways: long-term as well as short-term financial plans, which in turn are important for the achievement of business objectives.
1) Long-term Financial Plans -
This plan is also known as a Strategic financial plan. This plan generally covers the time period of 2 to 5 years or more than that. These plans require constant revisions in consequence of changing circumstances according to the result you get.
Long-term financial plans are generally prepared with long-term such as marketing plans and production plans. Together, this plan leads to the achievement of overall business objectives.
Various areas covered by this plan product, procurement for funds, creation of marketing plans etc. Such long-term plans are generally divided into long period plans of annual duration.
2) Short-Term Financial Plans -
These plans are also known as monthly or yearly plans. These plans are required to ensure that long-term plans remain on track. Short-term plans can also be for a period of 1 to 2 years. These plans require sales forecasts and other financial data as input and advertisement matters etc.
Short-term financial planning follows a sales forecast. Based on such a forecast, a Production plan is developed. This plan helps add new resources such as raw material, labour, Capital, assets and other operating expenses.Objectives of financial planning in businesses
Financial planning is a process by which the funds required for each course of action are decided. Financial planning means deciding in advance the financial activities to be carried on to achieve the basic objective of the firm.
The basic objective of the firm is to get maximum profit with minimum losses or risks. So, the basic purpose of financial planning is to make sure that adequate funds are raised at the minimum cost (optimal financing) and that they are used wisely.
Thus planners of financial policies must see that adequate finance is available with concern because an inadequate supply of funds will hamper operations and lead to a crisis. Proper planning is, therefore, necessary and important.
A financial plan has to consider capital structure, capital expenditure, and cash flow. The highest earnings can be assured only through financial planning. The wrong financial plan may ruin the business completely.
Financial planning is necessary to achieve the long-term and the short-term objectives of the firm and to protect the interest of all parties concerned.
Summary
Financial planning is a method or you can say it's a long-term strategy for intelligently managing your money so you may achieve your goals and objectives while navigating the financial blocks that come at every stage of life.
In the business world, Financial Planning is the process of estimating the capital required in your business. It is the process of framing financial matters in relation to procurement, investment and administration of funds of an enterprise.
The goal of financial planning is to reduce the risk associated with making future decisions. A sound financial plan helps you understand what will happen if certain events occur, allowing you to prepare accordingly. For example, if you know that you'll need $300,000 before retirement, this could help determine whether you should save aggressively now to reach that target date, or instead focus on saving 15% of your income a year.
FAQ's on Financial Planning useful?:
Finance is very crucial to any organization. Hence, utilizing finance without proper planning can make your business fail. Planning involves estimating the future need for finance, its investment in key areas, and executing the return estimate.
It provides direction to your goals or dreams. Financial planning helps you understand your goals better in terms of why you need to achieve these goals and how they impact other aspects of your life and finances.
Financial planning is a step-by-step strategy that helps you reach all your set goals in life and for that, you need a solid financial plan. A financial plan further serves as a guide in your life journey as it assists you in controlling your expenses, income, and investments.
