Finance

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In this course project, you will be asked to design an operating budget for a healthcare organization. For a for-profit entity, you can find the financial statements and any additional information on one of the many sites where such information is available, such as Zacks Investment Research, Yahoo Finance, MarketWatch, etc. For example, search the site with HCA Holdings’ ticker symbol (“HCA”) and then look for the “Financial” tab or section when you come to the sites HCA Holdings page. For the not-for-profit entity, you can locate a local, regional, or national nonprofit, religious-based healthcare system, and download and review the financial statements.Your project will have the following components:

  • Title page
  • Executive Summary
  • Assumptions
  • Financial and operational analysis
  • Benchmarks and comparative analysis
  • Operating Budget
  • Conclusion
  • References
  • Appendix Section and as needed (not included in the required page count)

Project ObjectivesTo successfully complete this project, you will be expected to:

  • Apply fundamental concepts and practices of financial management and accounting to a healthcare organization.
  • Analyze financial statements and other reports to evaluate the overall operational and financial stability of a healthcare organization.
  • Demonstrate an understanding of how financial indicators are used to make assumptions about future financial performance.
  • Demonstrate an understanding of how operational indicators are used to make assumptions about future operational performance.
  • Design an operating budget for a healthcare organization.
  • Develop recommendations for a healthcare organization that are
  • supported by financial and operational analysis and indicators.

The greatest value in a course comes from applying the concepts, theories, and principles explored during class. The operating budget project will be graded according to the criteria below and is worth 30% of your total grade. This project gives you an opportunity to select a healthcare organization with which you are familiar, analyze the operations and design an operating budget for the organization. Then, drawing on the concepts and principles from readings, exercises, current events, and class discussions, develop an operating budget project in which you:

  • Introduce the healthcare organization (background):
  • Define the operating and financial condition,
  • Analyze the organization using financial and operational indicators,
  • Search the literature for operational benchmarks of healthcare organizations and do a comparative analysis,
  • Offer assumptions,
  • Develop an operating budget to address financial and operational conditions; and
  • Develop a conclusion

As noted above, your project must include, but is not limited to, the following sections:

  1. Title Page: Include a title, date, your name, and the course name and number.
  2. Executive Summary: In the introduction, restate your approach and assumptions, the necessary background to your approach, and how you intend to address the key issues.
  3. Assumptions: In this section, you integrate the information from the financial and operational analyses, make assumptions about the current and future status of the organization, and provide the rationale and supporting data for each assumption. The presentation should provide the reader with sufficient information to understand and support the assumptions.
  4. Financial and Operational Analysis: In this section, you provide an in-depth analysis of the financial and operational issues of the healthcare organization, supported by relevant operational indicators, analysis, and current high-quality literature sources.
  5. Benchmarks and Comparative Analysis: Present what you discovered in your search of the literature for operational benchmarks of healthcare organizations. Do a comparative analysis based on the operational benchmarks and your financial and operational analysis.
  6. Operational Budget: In this section, present your best estimate, based on current knowledge and assumptions, of the financial operations of the organization for the following year (Year 2), using the current year (Year 1) as the base year.
  7. Conclusion: summarize your major findings and recommendations.

Back up your responses with at least ten (10) current sources (no older than three years), five (5) of which are peer-reviewed articles that must be obtained from the UC online library. You may use the course textbooks as prime references, but you may use other course readings. is a good venue to find your references and supporting sources. Submit a 10-12-page paper, not counting the title and references pages which you must include; and appendixes if needed. Format your paper according to the APA Requirements.