This course is part of the Finance & Accounting track.
Introduction to Leading with Finance

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Leading with Finance

$1,850
Next 6-week session starts January 22nd
Build an intuitive understanding of financial principles to better communicate with key stakeholders, drive business performance, and grow your career.
6
weeks
6-7
hours per week
6
modules
Self-Paced
with regular deadlines

 This course earns you a Certificate of Completion from HBS Online. What you earn.

Overview
Syllabus
Enrollment
Stories
FAQs

Key Concepts

Understand the key financial levers that drive financial performance
Discover how and why finance is concerned with cash flow versus profits and why that matters for your business and budget
Identify ways to create and measure value in order to evaluate and pitch potential projects
Examine how capital markets work and how they affect your business
Develop a financial intuition that will give you the confidence to make effective decisions in your career and life

Who Will Benefit

Gain the skills and confidence needed to understand the financial landscape of your business and industry in order to advance your career, especially if you’re in a non-finance role.
In an ever fast-changing world, it is important to keep abreast with how people around the world tackle finance-related issues and the experiences they go through.
Saad Hashmi
Associate Corporate Relationship Mangaer at HSBC Bank Middle East Limited
Prepare for future professional opportunities and jumpstart your career by gaining an understanding of financial concepts, terms, and principles.
Leading with Finance offered the perfect opportunity to refresh my core finance skills and interact with a global group of colleagues in an online format that was ideal for my schedule.
Praveen Jayakumar
Medical Director & Co-CMO at Culinary Health Fund
Elevate your business knowledge and prepare for leadership responsibilities, such as assessing value and performance, budgeting, and communicating the financial implications of your decisions.
The program expertly leads you through progressively more complex theories and analysis with a pace that keeps you challenged and engaged.
Lisa Arpey
Executive Board Member at Ford's Theatre

What You Earn

Certificate of Completion

Certificate of Completion

Boost your resume with a Certificate of Completion from HBS Online

Earn by: completing this course

Certificate of Specialization

Certificate of Specialization

Prove your mastery of finance and accounting

Earn by: completing any three courses within this subject area to earn a Certificate of Specialization

Syllabus

6 Modules, 35-40 Hours
Download full syllabus
6-7
hrs
Module 1

Financial Analysis

Understand the building blocks of financial analysis and develop an intuition for the concepts behind finance principles.

Highlights

Unidentified Industries
Ratios
Over Time
ShowHide Details

Concepts

  1. Examining the Balance Sheet
  2. Utilizing Ratios
  3. Finding Meaning
  4. Case: Unidentified Industries
  5. Comparisons

Featured Exercises

  • Categorize financial ratios
  • DuPont Analysis exercise
6-7
hrs
Module 2

Finance vs. Accounting

Identify the fundamental differences between accounting and finance, and examine the use of cash as a measurement of value creation.

Highlights

What Is Cash
Our First Measure of Cash
Cash Conversion Cycle
Hon Hai Sharp
ShowHide Details

Concepts

  1. What Is Cash? From Income to EBITDA...
  2. ...and then to Operating Cash Flows...
  3. Cash Conversion Cycle
  4. Time Value of Money

Featured Exercises

  • Balance sheet and financial ratios exercises
  • Calculate net present value
6-7
hrs
Module 3

Capital Markets

Build a strong understanding of the players in the financial services industry and contemplate the financial system, its flaws, and potential solutions.

Highlights

Institutional Investors
Signaling
Tops Friendly Market
ShowHide Details

Concepts

  1. Capital Market Participants
  2. Capital Market Problems
  3. Solutions
  4. Implications for Your Company

Featured Exercises

  • Evaluate perspectives on information asymmetry
6-7
hrs
Module 4

Creating Value

Explore the three pillars of value creation, why capital is costly, and how to use this information to benefit your organization.

Highlights

Three Sources of Value
Weighted Average Cost of Capital
Beta
ShowHide Details

Concepts

  1. How Is Value Created?
  2. Costs of Capital
  3. Cost of Equity
  4. Mistakes

Featured Exercises

  • Market-to-book ratios exercises
  • Match companies to their cost of debt and industries to their betas
6-7
hrs
Module 5

Valuation

Determine how the future affects value today, compare various valuation methods, and discuss potential risks involved in mergers and acquisitions.

Highlights

Common Multiples
Spirit Aerosystems
Dell, Inc
ShowHide Details

Concepts

  1. Valuation
  2. Multiples
  3. Problematic Methods
  4. Discounted Cash Flows
  5. Intricacies
  6. Mistakes

Featured Exercises

  • Calculate free cash flows, WACC, and terminal values
  • Practice scenario analysis
6-7
hrs
Module 6

Capital Allocation

Discuss capital allocation, analyze the various options companies have for investing their cash, and determine which “type” of money will empower new business ideas to flourish.

Highlights

The High-Class Problem of Too Much Cash
The Capital Allocation Decision Tree
Preparing for Mergers and Acqusitions
ShowHide Details

Concepts

  1. The Capital Allocation Problem
  2. How to Grow: Organic vs. Inorganic Growth
  3. Distributing Cash to Shareholders
  4. Distribution Motivations

Featured Exercises

  • Capital allocation decision tree analysis
  • Weigh value of dividends vs. share buybacks
  • Capstone project
Free E-Book

A Manager's Guide to Finance & Accounting

Learn about the difference between finance and accounting, the financial skills all managers need, and how taking an online course can help you achieve your educational goals and accelerate your career.

Our Difference

Leading with Finance will equip you with an intuitive knowledge of financial principles and enable you to understand the market in which your organization operates, create and assess value, and communicate business decisions to stakeholders.
Stay active by engaging in a new activity every three to five minutes and applying your knowledge through quizzes and a capstone project.
Stay active by engaging in a new activity every three to five minutes and applying your knowledge through quizzes and a capstone project.
Get social by collaborating with a global community of peers before, during, and after your course. Learners who successfully complete an HBS Online program will be added to the HBS Online Community's Official Networking Group and gain exclusive access to events and other networking opportunities.
Get social by collaborating with a global community of peers before, during, and after your course. Learners who successfully complete an HBS Online program will be added to the HBS Online Community's Official Networking Group and gain exclusive access to events and other networking opportunities.
Immerse yourself in real-world, case-based examples brought to life by industry-leading experts from companies like Heineken, Biogen, and Sanford C. Bernstein.
Immerse yourself in real-world, case-based examples brought to life by industry-leading experts from companies like Heineken, Biogen, and Sanford C. Bernstein.

About the Professor

Mihir Desai
Leading with Finance

Mizuho Financial Group Professor of Finance
"This course is about the big ideas of finance, and how they map the most important business and life decisions people make."

Dates & Eligibility

Starting
Jan
22
6 Weeks  $1,850 + applicable international taxes
Enrollment deadline January 16
View weekly calendar
Enroll Now
Starting
Mar
19
6 Weeks  $1,850 + applicable international taxes
Enrollment deadline March 13
View weekly calendar
Enroll Now
Starting
May
07
6 Weeks  $1,850 + applicable international taxes
Enrollment deadline May 1st
View weekly calendar
Enroll Now
  • No documentation required

All learners must be at least 18 years of age, proficient in English, and committed to learning and engaging with fellow participants throughout the course.

Learn about bringing this course to your organization.

Learner Stories

91%
gained deeper expertise in specific areas
I now feel that I have a broad overview of finance and can approach topics with a strong, integrated framework instead of approaching them in isolation.
Emer Moloney
Research Associate at Harvard Business School European Research Center
I use what I learned on a daily basis. Even though I'm not in a finance role and operating in a general management position, I need to make decisions utilizing the principles we learned on a daily basis. The course empowered me to do that with confidence.
Paul Accornero
International Commercial Director (MD) Asia Pacific & Americas
* Source: 2022 surveys and course data
 
All FAQs

Leading with Finance FAQs

Participants in Leading with Finance are eligible for a Certificate of Completion from Harvard Business School Online.

Participants are expected to fully complete all coursework in a thoughtful and timely manner. This will mean meeting each week’s course module deadlines and fully answering questions posed therein. This helps ensure your cohort proceeds through the course at a similar pace and can take full advantage of social learning opportunities. In addition to module and assignment completion, we expect participation in the social learning elements of the course by offering feedback on others’ reflections and contributing to conversations on the platform. Participants who fail to complete the course requirements will not receive a certificate and will not be eligible to retake the course.

More detailed information on course requirements will be communicated at the start of the course. No grades are assigned for Leading with Finance. Participants will either be evaluated as complete or not complete.

You will have access to the materials in every prior module as you progress through the program. Access to course materials and the course platform ends 60 days after the final deadline in the program.

At the end of each course module, you will be able to download a PDF summary highlighting key concepts and accounting and financial formulas used throughout the course. At the end of the program, you will receive a PDF compilation of all of the module summary documents. We hope the module summary documents will serve as a helpful resource after you finish the course.

Once you've earned your Certificate of Completion, list it on your resume along with the date of completion:

Harvard Business School Online
Certificate in Leading with Finance
[Cohort Start Month and Year]

List your certificate on your LinkedIn profile under "Education" with the language from the Credential Verification page:

School: Harvard Business School Online
Dates Attended: [The year you participated in the program
Degree: Other; Certificate in Leading with Finance
Field of Study: Leave blank
Grade: "Complete"
Activities and Societies: Leave blank

Description:
Leading with Finance is a 6-week, 40-hour online certificate program from Harvard Business School. Leading with Finance helps students understand key financial levers that drive financial performance, examine how the capital markets work, develop a toolkit for making smart financial decisions, and gain the confidence to clearly communicate those decisions to both internal and external stakeholders. The program was developed by leading Harvard Business School faculty and is delivered in an active learning environment based on the HBS signature case-based learning model.

 

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