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Scenarios in financial modelling

Author: Alex Carse

Published: 23 Nov 2021

Last month we presented a webinar on scenario modelling, hosted by David Lyford-Tilley and presented by Ben Ducker of RSM.

We have had great feedback on it. The webinar recording is available here but as it was an hour long and there was so much great content we thought it would be helpful to point you towards specific elements that you might find useful.

Below we have laid out the topics covers along with the timestamp in the webinar that they start, allowing you to jump straight to your topic of interest.

8:18 - Why use a scenario manager
Ben explains why a scenario manager is so powerful and which types of inputs you are likely to include in a scenario manager.

11:13 - Principles of a scenario manager
This section sets out what a scenario manager looks like and how to put it together both in terms of layout and key formulas.

13:12 - Retrofit model with Scenario manager
If you have a pre-built model, we explain how to add a scenario manager to it so you can easily and quickly make it more dynamic.

19:57 - Make the scenario manager easier to use
Tips for how to make the active inputs and scenarios more transparent to the user.

26:38 - Manage periodic data with scenario manager
A walk through of how to build a scenario within a scenario to allow periodic data to be manipulated by the scenario manager.

32:50 - Using form controls
How to create a form control that chooses your active scenario, allowing the active scenario to be changed from any sheet in the workbook.

37:20 - Track outputs through VBA
Stepping through the principles on how VBA could be used to generate and store the outputs of each scenario. This excludes discussion on the VBA code used – but we did also run a VBA webinar recently, recording here.

40:45 - Track outputs through Data Tables
Set out how to use Data Tables to automate generating outputs from each scenario

44:15 - Some pitfalls
Finally, a run through of some of the challenges and common issues faced when performing scenario analysis

It would be great to hear about any challenges you have had with scenario modelling that we haven’t covered here or modelling techniques you think it would be great to share with the community. Please contact us at excel@icaew.com.