Getting the Hood of an Annual Report

2017 e-Lit Award Winner

I am a senior, graduating in December and will be the first person in my family to graduate with a college degree.  ‘A Good Business Plan is a Beautiful Thing’ helped me get a better understanding of my future in business.  It helped understand, one day I will be able to open a business in my hometown.   Tyler Keck, Business School Student

“‘Getting Under the Hood of an Annual Report’ is a tremendous, user-friendly guide for both new and sophisticated investors, alike, offering great insight and perspective on how to understand and properly appraise the financial and operational performance of companies.”           Dodi Handy, CEO WallStreet Writer

The templates, modeling tools and student resource center that came with ‘A Good Business Plan is a Beautiful Thing’ were a great asset in completing my final project.  The book gave me a good understanding of business and how to succeed in the future.   Jessie Plunkett,  Business School Student

“Getting Under the Hood is an excellent handbook for being more effective making informed decisions whether to buy, sell or hold a stock.”          Mark Burnett, Managing Partner, Fuse Capital

The book was easy to adopt.  It needed minimal preparation time. The feedback guide helped me improve the rubric I was already using to give feedback to students about their projects.  Students found the book very useful and the cookbook approach encouraged their critical thinking.  They stopped worrying about the basics (format, what belonged where, etc.) and instead spent more time thinking about what went into each section.   The book gave students the detailed guidance they needed.  Because the book covered all the basics, I could then spend class time focusing on helping students with their individual projects.

The linked Excel spreadsheets made the financial aspects of the plan easier for students. For students not all that Excel savvy, the way things were laid out and explained didn’t require advanced Excel skills for the students to execute the financial sections. This saved my time and theirs. Instead they could concentrate on what numbers they were using and why.  The break even analysis helped some of them realize that, for example, paying themselves $100,000 a year starting in year 1 was not even close to realistic.  In fact, they found to break even by year three they had to pay themselves less than $20,000/year or rethink what they were planning to do and how they were planning to do it. Things like this led to interesting discussions in class.

The sections of the Excel sheets were linked together.  A change one place was automatically reflected everywhere it was relevant.  This also helped students realize how each part of the business was part of a larger integrated whole.  They came to understand that business functions did not operate as independent silos or operate in a vacuum.

I have used ‘A Good Business Plan is a Beautiful Thing’ both with MBA students, most of whom had significant work experience, and with first generation, undergraduate.  The depth of what each student, or group of students, created varied.   The templates, Excel modeling tools and Student Resource Center gave my students the detailed explanation they needed to help them create better, credible business plans.  It also helped remove some of their anxiety about building a business plan and allowed them to focus more on the actual business they were creating rather than the mechanics of doing a business plan.    Carolyn Birmingham, Assistant Professor, University of Arkansas, School of Business

 “Lots of authors talk about financial analysis; Bittar’s book truly nails it.  His book raises the bar for understanding how to get the most from a company’s annual report.”          John Conti, PMP

“I was very impressed with the books and assignments, as were my students. Based on students’ feedback this was one of the most helpful and memorable projects from the class”.      Dr. Joshua Hernsberger, Assistant Professor – Management, Gordon Ford College of Business, Western Kentucky University

“Getting under the Hood of an Annual Report” is an insightful and comprehensive guide that encompasses all of the fundamentals of an Annual Report.  It is an essential tool for those seeking a basic understanding or a must needed refresher of the analytical information that drives the capital markets.  It is delivered in simple terms, rather than jam-packed with overwhelming jargon.           Richard G. Satin, Partner, Schnader Harrison Segal & Lewis LLP

Donald Bittar’s book not only gets “under the  hood” , but also helps the reader understand the plumbing of commerce – recommend the book to both novice and seasoned investors.    Peter Stefanou, Managing Partner, RBSM LLP

The students liked using ‘Getting Under the Hood’.  They found it user friendly and easy to understand.   

Bahman Ebrahimi, Professor of Management, Daniels College of Business, University of Denver