Couse Instructor & Senior Co-teacher

Prof. Ronald R. King

Director of the Center for Experiential Learning, Senior Associate Dean-Special Projects and Myron Northrop Professor of Accounting

Washington University in St. Louis, Olin Business School

Ph.D. (1986) University of Arizona

Areas of Expertise: Accounting - Auditing; Accounting - Financial Reporting; Accounting - Regulation; Law and Economics

Prof. REN Mingchuan

Associate Professor, Dept. of Accounting

Fudan University, School of Management

Ph.D. 1998, University of Hull, UK

Areas of Expertise: Accounting in the UK and US, Accounting Profession, Corporate Reporting

Couse Description

The ability to read and effectively interpret financial statements is a core skill that every general manager needs to master in order to spot important trends, evaluate performance, and communicate effectively with shareholders, creditors, suppliers, customers and employees.  Indeed, financial accounting is a “language” that every successful general manager must “speak” if he or she is to guide the company effectively and maintain its financial integrity and reputation. With this perspective in mind, this course provides a hands-on experience in reading and using financial accounting information from the general manager’s perspective. Each student will examine his or her company’s four primary financial statements—its balance sheet; income statement; statement of cash flows; and statement of stockholders’ equity—to see how these statements provide a concise and consistent picture of the company’s business and financial state. Students will also learn to apply important tools used by accounting and finance professionals -- common-sizing, cash flow analysis; ratio analysis; assessing earning quality; and preparing pro forma financial statements -- and by comparing financial statements across a broad array of industries, learn to see the ways in which accounting statements provide important information about the company’s industry, its strategy, and its performance relative to its competitors.