Profit is built on the factory floor
---
Long before it appears in the accounts.
---
Profit is built on the factory floor --- Long before it appears in the accounts. ---
Manufacturing Finance for Operations Leaders
Understand how operational decisions become financial results.
Executive Education
From purchasing and production planning to inventory volumes, yields, wastage, throughputs, labour efficiency and operational performance, this practical two-day programme explains how manufacturing organisations create value, control costs, and improve profitability.
Level:
Executive Education
CPD Certification
Duration:
2 Days
9 am to 5 pm each day
Next Dates:
25th to 26th November 2026
10th to 11th March 2027
Location:
Dundee, Scotland
Investment:
£1,275 plus VAT
Understand how manufacturing really creates value
Manufacturing is one of the most commercially complex environments in business. Every decision made on the factory floor has a financial consequence.
Production planning. Machine utilisation. Downtime. Quality. Waste. Inventory. Labour Planning. Purchasing. Scheduling. Customer demand. All of these factors impact your operational performance and, consequently, your business’s profitability.
During this programme, you'll learn the major influences on operational performance and how they all connect financially, to allow leaders to improve profitability long before the month-end accounts arrive.
Profit is built on the factory floor.
Long before it appears in the accounts.
Why is this programme different?
Many manufacturing finance programmes begin with cost accounting.
This programme begins with the factory.
Manufacturing businesses succeed because operational leaders understand how purchasing, production, quality, inventory, maintenance, labour and customer demand work together to create commercial success.
Finance simply records the outcome.
By connecting operational excellence with financial performance, this programme helps manufacturing leaders make better decisions, improve efficiency and create lasting value.
Executive education should change the way you think.
Great manufacturing isn't simply about making products efficiently. It's about making commercially successful decisions every day.
This programme combines real manufacturing leadership experience with practical commercial finance, giving you knowledge you can apply immediately within your own organisation.
What you'll learn
This programme focuses on the operational drivers that determine factory profitability.
Together we'll explore:
-
Follow the journey from customer order through purchasing, production, quality, warehousing, dispatch and payment to understand where value is created, where costs accumulate and where operational decisions influence financial performance.
-
Explore how labour, materials, overheads, and production volumes influence product costs, bills of materials, pricing decisions, and manufacturing profitability.
-
Understand how production planning, scheduling, machine utilisation, labour productivity and capacity management influence operational and financial performance.
-
Discover how inventory management, supplier performance, purchasing decisions and lead times affect working capital, cash flow and customer service.
-
Learn how scrap, rework, downtime, process variation and unnecessary complexity quietly reduce profitability and operational efficiency.
-
Understand how inventory, debtors, creditors, seasonal businesses, and day-to-day operational decisions influence liquidity and cash generation.
-
Learn how forecasting supports production planning, investment decisions, continuous improvement and long-term business growth.
-
Understand how ERP systems, operational reports and key performance indicators such as OEE, yield, throughput and inventory turns provide the information needed to monitor performance, identify improvement opportunities and support better business decisions.
-
Interpret operational reports alongside Profit & Loss Accounts, Balance Sheets and Cash Flow Statements to understand how manufacturing performance is reflected financially.
-
Develop the commercial confidence to connect operational decisions with financial outcomes, improve profitability and contribute more effectively to business success.
Who should attend?
This programme is designed for manufacturing professionals responsible for operational performance, continuous improvement and business results.
It is particularly valuable for:
Operations Directors
Operations Managers
Manufacturing Managers
Production Managers
Factory Managers
Engineering Managers
Continuous Improvement Leaders
Supply Chain Managers
Purchasing Managers
Plant Managers
Managing Directors
Manufacturing Business Owners
No formal finance qualifications are required.
By the end of the programme you'll be able to...
✔ Understand how manufacturing businesses create profit.
✔ Appreciate end-to-end manufacturing from a financial perspective.
✔ Connect operational decisions with financial performance.
✔ Improve product costing and pricing decisions.
✔ Reduce financial leakage across manufacturing processes.
✔ Improve inventory and working capital management.
✔ Understand key manufacturing performance measures.
✔ Communicate more effectively with finance teams.
✔ Make commercially stronger operational decisions.
Meet your programme leader
Heather Ogilvie
Heather Ogilvie is a former Group Strategist, Chief Financial Officer, and Chartered Accountant, an International Turnaround Specialist and Executive Advisor with more than thirty years' experience helping organisations transform, grow, and improve commercial performance.
A Financial Times Women in Business Mentor and founder of the charity MoneyMinds Scotland SCIO, Heather is passionate about helping people build confidence with money and understand how businesses really work. She has taught hundreds of people about business, finance and commercial decision-making, and is known for explaining complex concepts in simple, practical and memorable ways.
Heather believes finance shouldn't be intimidating. It should give people the confidence to ask better questions, make better decisions, and contribute more effectively to both their organisation's and their own personal success.
Why Ogilvie Business School?
At Ogilvie Business School, all education is delivered by experienced practitioners who have led organisations, solved real business challenges and understand what it takes to create lasting commercial success.
Our programmes combine practical experience with structured learning, giving participants knowledge they can apply immediately within their own organisations.
We believe great executive education doesn't simply increase knowledge.
It changes the way you think.
Why Choose This Programme
Learn from a former Group CFO, Chartered Accountant, and international turnaround specialist with extensive experience in international manufacturing.
✓ Practical manufacturing finance built on real operational leadership.
✓ Improve the quality of your decisions, conversations and commercial confidence.
✓ Apply what you learn immediately in your organisation.
✓ Small executive cohort
✓ CPD Certificate on successful completion.
✓ Membership of the Ogilvie Business Alumni Network.
Programme Fee
£1,275 plus VAT
Your programme fee includes:
Two full days of expert teaching
Course materials
Refreshments and lunch
Certificate of Completion
Membership of the Ogilvie Business Alumni Network, with access to networking opportunities, programme updates and exclusive alumni offers
Ready to strengthen operational performance?
Whether you're leading a production line, managing a factory, or overseeing manufacturing operations, understanding the financial impact of operational decisions will transform how you lead.
Join us in Dundee for two practical days that will change how you think about manufacturing performance.