Buy an essay on Personal skills development

The aim of this essay is to reflect of personal skills development as well as new knowledge and skills that were acquired in the process of working on the MDP module. The main objective of this module was to understand the concept of financial management basing on personal financial planning, and creating an appropriate framework for recording, managing, planning and analyzing personal financial issues. The framework was realized using the means of MS Excel, since it provides an easy-to-use and friendly interface combined with many statistical and calculation features that make the process of financial planning and analysis efficient and conveniently visualized.
1. Selection of methods and processes
In order to reach objective of the MDP module, a system for planning and calculating personal finance needed to be chosen. In order to select the appropriate system, I have reviewed several free software programs offering personal finance accounting, and researched the internet for suitable models of calculating. The requirements for the model were: relative simplicity, the division of income and spending that could be compared to my expenses, and the presentation which could be easily visualized. After this analysis, I have created Excel spreadsheets with the division of costs. I have rejected dividing incomes basing on the fact that I do not have many sources of income, and there is no need of analyzing the efficiency of income sources. However, it was a useful experience for me to separate the expenses into two “accounts”: outgoing and miscellaneous expenditure. This allowed me to estimate which spending could be easily regulated, and which items of expenses require first-line attention.
As the means of showing and calculating personal balance for each month, Excel spreadsheets with a fixed structure were used; they included not only income and two types of expenditure, but also the overall balance of available money and estimate of finance remaining per week for each month. Though this structure was not exactly my own invention, but was rather inspired by Internet research and course recommendations, it allowed me to keep track of balance and available money not only every month, but also every week, and due to this system I have learnt to control personal finance while keeping in mind how much I can afford for miscellaneous expenditure. Also, a resulting table and the conclusion concerning the availability of holiday were important elements of personal financial plan.
The resulting table with total income and total expenditure listed for all period from October to March as well as balance and remainder per week dynamics allowed to see the real changes and effect of financial management; it appeared that checking the difference of income and outcome every month and comparison with previous periods give the change to have a clear picture of future development and possibilities in mind, without speaking about greater precision of spending and elimination of occasional expenses. Also, the last page with a conclusion whether I could go for a holiday acted as a very strong motivator.
Finally, the diagram where income, expenditure, balance and remainders per week are shown played in important role in critical analysis of personal financial position: the dynamics of income was clearly visible (which could not be reached and fully understood before this financial planning experience), as well as expenditure growth (it is not so evident during daily routine).
2. Work progress
First part of work progress was theoretical analysis, selection of appropriate “accounting” model and analysis of personal income and expenses. Then, it took me some time to choose a spreadsheet representation for this theoretical model, and the most part that caused difficulties and questions was implementing all the calculations, building a spreadsheet structure, summarizing data from all periods and creating a graph in order to provide a convenient illustration of data. While formulas of financial calculation in Excel were not very difficult due to their linearity, the concluding formula at the last sheet required to study conditional functions in MS Excel and to understand its principles. However, this problem was successful solved. Summary spreadsheet also did not create many troubles, beside the diagram; it took me some time to represent all graphs at one diagram and select its appropriate form so that all dynamics could be clearly visible. However, the time spent on creating this diagram was quite efficient since it was the graphical representation that allowed me to estimate the dimension of expenditure growth, and led to adjustment of miscellaneous expenditures.
3. Performance improvement
The task of personal financial management was completed successfully, and the problems identified by this assessment as well as new skills learnt during implantation of financial planning create a space for great improvement of performance. Considering my financial performance, it has already improved which can be seen from expenditure, income and balance graph. Moreover, I have learnt to control occasional spending, and worked out the ability to act consistently in order to reach a long-term goal. Though, the deficiency of the model that was created in Excel is that its long-term goal is to have overall personal balance greater than zero in order to afford summer holidays. In reality, though, there exists some minimal balance sum that is needed for a holiday, and it is reasonable to establish this sum as a minimum for going on holiday. Also, the flaw of the model is that is does not suggest long-term expenditure after March, and focuses only on positive balance. Therefore, if I were to create such a model once again, I would take into account the above-mentioned factors and provide some means of advice of expenditure control, e.g. the maximal amount of expenditure per week (or miscellaneous expenditure per week) that will allow to reach the pre-set sum of balance to a given month. Conditional functions of MS Excel and conditional formatting could be used for further improvement of this model.
Conclusion
The management of personal finance performed during learning MDP module and its Excel implementation were an important experience for me: basic principles of managing finance, analyzing the items of expense and setting long-term goals were considered and applied to a practical objective. The procedure of financial planning and control appeared to be more difficult that it seemed in the beginning, and there were several difficulties which have been then overcome. As a result, my financial performance, understanding of income-outcome balance and cost control have greatly improved as well as the skills of using modern software means such as MS Excel for financial tasks.