Business Finance Essentials

Learn finance and accounting through simple, layman language, as a civil engineer unfolds a relatable approach and launches the AHAR video series to educate and inspire.

Master the four financial transactions—money comes in, money goes out, money supposed to come in, and money supposed to go out—to read any business's financial statements and make fact-based decisions.

A bookkeeper records all four types of financial transactions—money in, money out, money expected in, and money expected out—keeping books up to date to reveal profit.

Accountants act as referees enforcing rules and taxation office regulations while guiding clients in financial planning, advising, mentoring, and coaching; finance begins where accounting ends.

In business, every decision affects the bottom line, proving that non finance roles are not separate from finance; sales pricing, budgeting, raises, and discounts all matter.

Record every financial transaction with journal entries, organize them under accounting heads, and prepare a trial balance and financial statements. Then use finance to make key business decisions.

Discover how financial capital and intellectual capital drive start, manage, and grow a business, including insider and outsider funding and related balance sheet liabilities.

Identify the three business types, manufacturing, service, and retail, and learn how selling a product or service for profit hinges on understanding costs and capital.

Master the two rules in business by reading and understanding financial statements—profit and loss, balance sheet, and cash flow—to determine profit beyond turnover.

Balance sheets balance assets, liabilities, and sources of funds. It details capital, share capital, retained earnings, and current versus noncurrent assets and liabilities.

Learn how a profit and loss statement maps sales to incomes and expenses, breaking costs into variable and fixed, calculating gross profit, ebitda, net profit, dividends, and retained earnings.

Identify the break-even point as the sales level where total cost equals total sales, covering fixed and variable costs. Aim to reach break-even sooner to maximize profit.

Grasp how depreciation allocates the consumed portion of assets as an expense, illustrated by a coffee machine and car, and understand ranges for heavy equipment, furniture, and information technology equipment.

Learn why profit equals income minus expenditure, not money, and how depreciation affects profit on the loss statement, even when the bank balance is negative.

Learn how a cash flow statement tracks beginning-of-month cash, cash receipts and payments across operating, asset, and financing activities, revealing when cash comes and goes and why profit isn't cash.

Understand why debit and credit matter in the double entry system, and how a single transaction affects assets, expenses, incomes, and liabilities, with money in credited and money out debited.

Prioritize leftover over turnover by focusing on how much you keep. Measure sales by profit margins to ensure a positive impact on profit and the bottom line.

Examine how McDonald's uses a low-margin burger to attract customers while driving profits on drinks and sides. Assess your product mix to boost margins across categories.

See how using other people's money (opm) and leverage changes profitability and earnings per share, illustrated by two identical firms funded differently, with tax implications and dividends vs interest.

Aim to earn five times your market value as an employee when running your own business, recognizing long hours and growth toward 100k, 150k, or even 1 million.