Written by Nils R. | Jun 21, 2020 7:00:00 AM
What is
a
Multi-Year Forecast Input Template
? Multi-Year Forecasts are considered strategic planning tools that are used by executives and budget managers to get a long term perspective on the organization's financial outlook. A key functionality in this type of planning template allows input of next year's budget at the monthly level, while the following years are entered as quarterly figures. The row level data can be entered by GL account or at a more summarized level. You will find an example of this type of planning template below.
Purpose of
Multi-Year Forecasts Companies and organizations use Multi-Year Forecasts to enable executives and planning managers to get a long term perspective of key revenues, expenses and other relevant metrics. When used as part of good business practices in a Financial Planning & Analysis (FP&A) Department, a company can improve its decision-making capability as well as mitigate the risk that the company makes short term decisions that are misaligned with its long range direction.
Multi-Year Forecast
Example Here is an example of a Multi-Year forecast template that enables input of a 5 year plan. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="1859"]
Multi-Year Forecast Input Template Example[/caption] You can find hundreds of additional examples
here.
Who Uses This Type of
Planning Template
? The typical users of this type of planning template are: The Board of Directors, Executives, CFO and the Budget Manager.
Other
Planning template
s Often Used in Conjunction with
Multi-Year Forecasts Progressive Financial Planning & Analysis (FP&A) Departments sometimes use several different Multi-Year Forecasts, along with strategic plans, Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and other management and control tools.
Where Does the Data for Analysis Originate From? The Actual (historical transactions) data typically comes from enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems like: Microsoft Dynamics 365 (D365) Finance, Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central (D365 BC), Microsoft Dynamics AX, Microsoft Dynamics NAV, Microsoft Dynamics SL, Sage Intacct, Sage 100, Sage 300, Sage 500, Sage X3, SAP Business One, SAP ByDesign, Netsuite and others. In analyses where budgets or forecasts are used, the data most often originates from in-house Excel spreadsheet models or from professional corporate performance management (CPM/EPM) solutions.
What Tools are Typically used for Reporting, Planning and Dashboards? Examples of business software used with the data and ERPs mentioned above are:
- Native ERP report writers and query tools
- Spreadsheets (for example Microsoft Excel)
- Corporate Performance Management (CPM) tools (for example Solver)
- Dashboards (for example Microsoft Power BI and Tableau)
Corporate Performance Management (CPM) Technology Solutions and More Examples
