Business Management Articles

How to Determine Your Competitive Edge

This article describes how small businesses can determine their competitive edge and use the Live Plan Lean Planning process to document, evaluate and focus on the necessary business information needed to build a financial roadmap.

How to create a one page business plan using the Lean Planning Process and LivePlan

Lean business planning is a way to optimize your business with focus, specific steps, tracking results, and changing quickly. The principles of lean business planning are to do only what you need, track and review often, expect change, develop accountability, and remember it’s planning, not accounting.

Three Basic Forms of Business Organization

In the United States, most business enterprises are organized as sole proprietorships, partnerships, or corporations. However, a limited liability company is a business entity type that provides a partnership or sole proprietorship with the limited liability protection of a corporation.

The Basics of Job Costing

Job order costing is typically used by businesses that tailor their goods and services to the specific needs of individual customers. In job order costing, the costs of direct materials, direct labor, and overhead are accumulated separately for each job.

The advantages and disadvantages of budgeting

A budget is a comprehensive financial plan setting forth the expected route for achieving the financial and operational goals of your business. Budgeting is an essential step in effective financial planning. Even the smallest business will benefit from preparing a formal written plan for its future operations.

How to create a budget for your business

A business may need a budget in order to model what its future results and cash flows will look like. Doing so gives management a reasonable idea of how much it can spend, and how much new revenue it should expect.

Types of budgeting models

There are a number of alternative budgeting models available that include, static budgeting, zero-based budgeting, flexible budgeting, incremental budgeting, the rolling budget, and the rolling forecast.

The objectives of budgeting

Budgeting helps business to provide structure, predict cash flows, allocate resources, model scenarios and measure performance.

The difference between a budget and a forecast

The key difference between a budget and a forecast is that a budget lays out the plan for what a business wants to achieve, while a forecast states its actual expectations for results, usually in a much more summarized format.

How to create a financial plan for your business

Proper financial planning will increase your company’s ability to foresee and address potential problems, and to adapt to any changes that may arise.

How to get started with a cloud accounting system using QuickBooks Online

A cloud accounting system will make your life so much easier and give you the critical numbers for your business in real time.