Business Acumen - Financial Literacy

Financial literacy deals with an employee’s understanding of the way a business is run which gives him a deeper insight into the financial parameters of a company. Organizations nowadays are investing a lot of time in building the financial literacy of their employees, so that they can have a clearer idea and an overall context within which they can expect to bring changes to the working environment.

This thought-process brings a much-needed change in the approach to work and reflects on the quality and volume of output. Managers now understand the need to provide their team members an accurate information about financial reports and results. Without transparency on these levels, employees start being suspicious which impacts their performance negatively.

Depending on which department a particular employee is from, he will gauge his own performance on some important matrices. For someone into the Business Operations side of an organization, he will have to keep a record of performances based on −

      Sales DataHow much volume has been sold to the market

      Customer loyalty and retentionCustomers who value the brands

      ProductivityVolume of output and number of targets met

      Gross MarginA record of the company's monthly profit and loss

      OverheadConstant recurring expenses

      Variable CostsNew partners, acquisitions, benefits, medical insurances

      InventoryThe amount of stock the company has

      Hours Worked/ProcessHours the employees producing the output

For someone into Talent Acquisition and HR policy-making, it’s imperative that he understands the way the people getting recruited influence the working environment of the company. Most HRs gauge the performances of the employees hired in different processes on a monthly basis so that they can calculate the performance incentives and other benefits accordingly. Some of the parameters that form an integral part of HR Metrics are as follows −

      HeadcountNumber of employees

      TurnoverHow productive the employees are

      AbsencesPaid and unpaid costs to the company

      Employees Trained/Training HoursAmount of time spent on training employees and expenses born on the training

      Employee EngagementFrequent discussion with employees to understand their view of the company

      Customer Service/SatisfactionThe perception that a company has in public's mind

      DiversityGetting people from different backgrounds to the workforce

      Performance Management ScoresKeeping track of necessary parameters to optimize employee performance