Projecting the costs of your strategic initiatives

The ability to project the costs of your strategic initiatives provides vital planning information. Can you afford to fund all of the strategic initiatives you're planning? Or will you need to raise additional funding, or defer some of your initiatives until a later date?

StratNavApp.com Financial Projection provides the answers.

What the Financial Projection shows

The Financial Projection shows the projected BA revenues and costs, as well as the costs of all of your Strategic Initiatives, for 12 months starting from the current month.

The Financial Projection is presented as a table.

1. The months are laid out as columns and identified as month/year in MM/yyyy format.
2. The itemised financials are laid out as rows as follows:
   1. All BAU revenues, then
   2. All BAU costs, then
   3. All Strategic Initiative costs.
3. The totals for each of those three categories are provided at the bottom of each section.
4. In addition, the table shows:
   1. Operating Profit/Loss: the BAU revenues less BAU costs.
   2. Net Profit/Loss: Operating Profit/Loss less Strategic Initiative Costs.
   3. Cumulative Net Profit/Loss: each month's Net Profit/Loss added to the cumulative Net Profit/Loss from the previous month.

You can filter the report to include or exclude:

1. Completed Strategic Initiatives
2. Mothballed Strategic Initiatives
3. Rejected Strategic Initiatives

Where to capture your costs

You can capture details of your BAU revenues and costs at the bottom of your Business Model Canvas, Enhanced Business Model Canvas and/or Lean Canvas.

You can capture details about your Strategic Initiatives' costs on the initiative's page. Click on the name of a Strategic Initiative to open the initiative's page, or click the plus sign at the top of the page to create a new one.

You can capture lump-sum (one-off), recurring, or spread costs, as well as details about when they are incurred, to drive the projection.

Where to find the Financial Projection

To find your Financial Projection:

1. Log in to StratNavApp.com.
2. Select the project you want to work with.
3. Click "Planning" on the main menu.
4. Select "Financial" on the selector at the top of the screen.

Warning

No one can predict the future. The Financial Projection is based on the assumptions you captured about your initiatives and their expected costs. Assumptions can be wrong. Circumstances can change. While the Financial Projection is a useful planning tool, you should not assume it is an accurate prediction of what will happen.

Luckily, the integrated nature of StratNavApp.com means that any changes you make to your strategy will be immediately reflected in your Financial Projection.

See also:

• Turning your strategy into action: Planning in StratNavApp.com.