NPO Success Hub

The course uses the Colour Accounting Learning System, which makes accounting simple by approaching the subject visually. You will progress your understanding of Accounting and Financial Statements so that you can better communicate financial concepts with your stakeholders, e.g. trustees, staff and your accountants.

• Understand the key accounting categories of Assets, Liabilities, Funds (Equity), Income and Expenses. 
• Know what is on a Balance Sheet, what is in the Statement of Financial Activity (SOFA) and how these link to each other. 
• Know how double entry accounting works. 
• Understand accounting concepts such as income recognition, asset acquisitions, depreciation, prepayments, accruals and deferrals. 
• Have a better understanding of the financial reporting requirements for NPOs in the UK. 
• Have built your confidence in communicating around financial matters with your team, accountants, or stakeholders. 
• Be able to read Financial Statements more thoroughly. 

There are 10 minutes included at the end for a dedicated Q&A session.

Dates

• No upcoming dates

Budgets allow charities to look at the past, take stock of the present, and plan for the future. They use information from various sources, starting with income and expenses, and build on that to develop trends, patterns, and assumptions. The benefits of budgeting are huge. They allow charities to keep finances under control, avoid poor decision-making, and promote long-term sustainability. This workshop provides a practical guide to budgeting, showing charity the fundamentals of the budget, exactly how they can balance, and the need for long-term thinking and financial strategy.

This workshop will cover:

• Refresh on the meaning of SOFA
• The basics, the benefits, and the importance of budgeting
• How to create a future budget
• Simple and practical tips for balancing a budget
• The basics of cash flow forecasting and cashflow process
• The need for long-term thinking and financial strategies
• Where to find useful resources

Registration:

• No upcoming dates

All charities must keep financial records, demonstrating income, Gift Aid payments, details of substantial donors, and more. Financial reporting is a legal requirement, but it also provides a significant benefit to charities in terms of future planning, future-proofing, and strategy. This workshop will run through the basics, showing how to report finances for both the statutory and management accounts and will also include a step-by-step guide looking at each phase in detail and explaining requirements along the way. We will also look at how charities can use analyses of variances (to budget and previous year) to help them better plan, take corrective actions and revise their strategy. 

This workshop will cover:

• The difference between statutory accounts and management accounts
• Exactly what is needed for a useful financial statement
• How to report income and variances to budget and last year
• Understanding and reporting variables costs (cost of sales) and overheads
• How to analyse variances and develop corrective plans
• How to generate a cashflow forecast, understand it and act on it

Who should attend:

• People involved in financial decision-making
• People interested in refreshing financial knowledge
• Finance staff interested in deepening their financial skills

Registration:

• No upcoming dates

Sustainability is an essential part of budgeting. It’s often easy to take stock of your current situation, but a greater challenge lies in predicting, assessing, and preparing for the future. Sustainability is vital for charities, as it allows them to support service users in the long-term. But it is seldom a priority, with too many charities struggling to adopt a long-term financial vision. This workshop will provide you with the tools to prioritise sustainability. It will give you a framework that you can apply in practice, ensuring your future. 

This workshop will cover:

• The fundamentals of financial sustainability
• How to review income reliance and practice cash flow governance, cost control, income diversification, and more
• The importance of financial strategy, culture, leadership, and infrastructure
• How to write a sound financial management policy

Who should attend:

• Financial and non-financial people involved in charity finance
• Trustees who need to assess financial information
• Anyone involved in financial decision-making

Registration:

• No upcoming dates

Good practice in volunteer management is key to unlocking the potential of volunteering in your organisation. This online course provides an introduction to the key principles of good practice in volunteer management and how to apply them to your organisation.  

By the end of the day, you will: 

• Be able to demonstrate the key principles of good practice in managing, supporting and motivating volunteers
• Understand the legal status of volunteers
• Explore typical situations and how to resolve them

Who should attend:

This course is aimed at those new to volunteer management and those who manage volunteers, as well as those who need a refresher.

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All voluntary organisations have a duty to keep the people they work with safe from harm. This course introduces the basics of safeguarding within a charity context and highlights effective safeguarding practice. Safeguarding means the range of measures we have in place to protect people in our organisation, or those we come into contact with, from abuse and maltreatment of any kind. This means we have to think about safeguarding in everything we do: including policy and procedure writing, roles and responsibilities, safer recruitment, concerns and complaints management, ethical fundraising, quality assurance and safeguarding risk assessments of all our activities.

By the end of the course you will be able to: 

• Understood the principle safeguarding duties to staff, volunteers, children and adults at risk of harm and others in contact with your organisation within current law and policy 
• Considered types of harm and how to spot signs of abuse
• Understood effective management of concerns and allegations 
• Considered safer working practices for your organisation which embed safeguarding practices in your organisation

Who should attend:

This course is aimed at anyone who has responsibility for safeguarding within an organisation and who is leading policy and/or implementation of safeguarding practices in organisations that engage staff and volunteers.

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This online course will give an overview and understanding of charity governance, regulation and best practice. This training will take place over two half days and you need to attend both days of the same course. 

By the end of the course you will:

• Understand what governance and trusteeship is
• Know who the trustees are and what they do
• Understand the personal liabilities of trustees and the protection available
• Be able to identify and implement principles of good charity governance
• Consider how to govern in the current climate and work with your fellow trustees to agree ways of working as a board

Who should attend:

This course is for anyone who’s new to governance and trusteeship or existing trustees and senior staff who would benefit from a refresher course. This course could also form part of an induction for a new trustee.

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Being clear on your outcomes and impact can help you plan, manage and improve your work, making the biggest difference you can for your beneficiaries. On this course, you’ll learn how to create an evaluation plan that will enable you to understand and demonstrate the difference your work makes. The course also includes a brief introduction to ways to collect data. If you want to learn how to effectively monitor and evaluate the work you do and the difference it makes, this course is for you.

By the end of this course you will have:

• A better understanding of monitoring and evaluation theory and practice
• Improved ability to identify and describe the outcomes and impact of your work
• Increased ability to develop an evaluation framework to help assess your organisation’s effectiveness and impact.

Who should attend:

We recommend this course to anyone that wants to learn more about monitoring and evaluation. It's particularly useful if you are new to outcome and impact measurement, responsible for managing and reporting to funders and trustees, or are in the planning stages of a project or service.

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As a trustee, an understanding of finance, financial management, corporate and management metrics and reporting is essential in carrying out your role and exercising “good” governance. This specially developed training course will provide you with increased confidence and greater ability to review and assess financial information, improving your ability to monitor resources, articulate impact and make better decisions.

By the end of the course, you will have:

• Identified the core financial documents that a charity must publish 
• An understanding of the ways in which accounts are presented
• Explored the key reporting areas of financial management and control
• Been given tips for reading management accounts
• An understanding of the role and responsibilities of all trustees in relation to the finances of the charity

Who should attend:

This course is for Trustees who feel they would benefit from a better understanding of their charity's finances and accounts. Existing trustees and senior staff who need a refresher session. 

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