That way, you will also feel more confident in your decisions. To a certain extent, this will let you keep a handle on most things, maintaining a degree of awareness about how the business is really performing, instead of simply and blindly going along with what your accountants tell you. That’s all well and good, but don’t you think it would be better if you knew a little more about the basics of financial statements analysis? It doesn’t mean that you should know the often too intricate processes and methodologies of analyzing financial statements, but only to get the basic idea or the gist of things. In short, in business language that they can understand. In fact, that is the reason why you hear about a lot of company executives leaving the job in the hands of staff members who they think have the right qualifications and knowledge.įor example, they’ll have their accountants do the reviewing – more formally, it is referred to as “financial statements analysis” – and then have them interpret the results and make recommendations in layman’s terms. For someone with very little to no background in accounting or financial matters, making business decisions based on the results of reviewing and analyzing financial statements and other financial reports can be quite intimidating.