1	The Business Management Game
2	The Boardroom The boardroom is where you will make decisions about running your company. Click "+" to increase, or "-" to decrease Students learn : The mechanics of making boardroom decisions in the game.
3	Adjusting Production Note that in this example, your orders still exceed your production. In this case, you should increase your price to maximise profit. Students Learn: That they should raise their price if demand exceeds production capacity, make some profits, and then buy more production capacity later.
4	Adjusting Prices Note that in this example, your orders still exceed your production. In this case, you should increase your price to maximise profit. Students Learn: That they should raise their price if demand exceeds production capacity, make some profits, and then buy more production capacity later.
5	Virtual Share Market This is your virtual share market where you can track the share prices of all your competitors. Students Learn: That their companies, and their classmates’ companies, are listed on a virtual share market, in which they can buy and sell shares to increase their net worth.
6	More Graphs Students Learn : To investigate other players and companies to learn from their triumphs and tragedies, and also to decide which shares they may like to buy. Graphs available include total assets, cash on hand, production, sales, retail prices, and advertising.
7	Market Information Here you can see what the competitors are up to. How well are they matching orders to available supply? Students Learn: That they are competing in a common market with their classmates. The effect of price and advertising on market share and sales. Which mix of price and advertising may be best for the current market conditions. Which companies are being managed well, and may be targets for investment.
8	The Big Board Here you can invest in the virtual share market. You must offer a price slightly higher than the "Computer Valuation" to succeed. Students Learn: The mechanics of buying shares. Evaluating potential investments e.g. by asset backing, return on investment, market share, share price trends, etc.
9	Latest Share Transactions Here you can see who was successful in buying shares during the last 60 seconds. (60 seconds in this game represents 1 month of business activity). Students Learn: Who is buying which shares on the market, and at what price. This will give them clues as to which shares they may investigate themselves, and what price to offer. The operation of a share market.
10	Profit and Loss Account This is your "monthly" P & L account. It details the income and expenditure for your company, and tells you your profit or loss after tax. Students Learn: Where their money is going. Where they can cut costs. What a profit and loss account is.
11	Personal Finance This shows your latest dividend income after tax, and your net worth, which is made up from your cash on hand and the value of your shares. Students Learn: Where their personal revenue comes from. The meaning of "share portfolio". The meaning of "net worth".
12	Hall of Fame This is the scoreboard for the game. Look at the players who are doing well. What are they doing right? Check out their marketing and investment strategies. Students Learn: How well they are doing in relation to other players. Which players are doing well, which should spur students to investigate other companies and their strategies.
13	Bank Statement Statement showing actual cash movements during the month. Students Learn: About debits and credits. To use financial information to extract useful business information. For instance, from here they can work out their fixed and variable costs per unit. They can see roughly how much operating capital they will need for the following month. They can also see where they can cut costs if times get hard – interest, advertising, dividend payouts, and production.
14	Financial Information Students Learn : How much money other companies are making in relation to their own. They should take a closer look at the most profitable ones and learn from what they are doing. High cash reserves may indicate that a company is about to expand. How will this affect their market share? Should they invest in this company? Conversely low cash reserves may indicate that the company is about to “exit the market”. Should they sell their shares in this company? Should they pay off debt and reduce their interest costs?
15	The Business Cycle There is a business cycle built in to the game, which is time dependent. In this example, you can see a severe downturn in all company sales at the far side of the graph. From the top of the hour (GMT time) until 15 minutes past, there is a boom. From 15 minutes past until half past, the market growth slows. From 30 minutes past until 45 minutes past, there is a recession. From 45 minutes past to the top of the hour, there is a recovery. Students Learn: That the business cycle exists. That they need to pay heed to forecasts. How to survive in a tough climate. How to take advantage of the good times.
16	Banking Your company is able to borrow money from the bank. You have five accounts at varying monthly interest rates, and varying credit limits. Your credit limit will depend on how well you are running your company. Run it well, and you will have plenty of credit for expansion. Run it not well, and you will have no credit. Students Learn: That the more money they borrow, the higher the interest rate. That good credit is essential for expansion of a business. That idle money should be used to pay off credit. To balance the cost of the loan against the money being made from it.
17	Boardroom Tool Tips Mousing over the headings of the left hand side of the boardroom gives some very helpful hints. These tool tips require a special version of HTML which may or may not be available from your server. Information which may be helpful to your IT department can be found in the appendices. Students Learn: What the terminology means Some useful hints about business strategy.
18	Boardroom Tool Tips Students Learn: That it’s no good ordering a new factory, and then not having enough cash to run it. They will need working capital in addition to the cost of any new factories. I like to use the example of buying a Ferrari and then not being able to buy the gas. They will need to do a budget, including how much they can borrow from the bank. They will need to decide if there is room in the market-place for new production. They will need to decide if a new factory will be profitable, taking into account the extra costs, the current supply and demand in the market, and the prevailing economic climate.
19	Boardroom Tool Tips Students Learn : That when you drive a new car off the lot it depreciates on the other side of the pavement. That running out of cash can be really expensive. That accountants are ruthless in valuing assets. That sometimes you just have to bite the bullet and take a loss in order to survive at all.
20	Boardroom Tool Tips Students Learn : The limits to production. That even big companies cannot always expand as fast as they would like, but have to save money out of profits in order to expand.
21	Boardroom Tool Tips Students Learn : The difference between orders and sales. That they need to balance orders, production, price, advertising, and stock levels in order to maximise profit.
22	Boardroom Tool Tips Students Learn : The importance of maintaining a sensible level of inventory in order to take advantage of any sudden surge in the market, without tying up so much money in inventory that they incur huge interest charges. Many features of this game call for sensible judgement. They should notice the difference between stock meaning inventory, and stock meaning shares.
23	Boardroom Tool Tips Students Learn : That they have control over how much they produce, up to the limit of the production capacity. There is a good opportunity here for teachers to pause the simulation briefly to explain the difference between fixed and variable costs, and how to use this information in making business decisions.
24	Boardroom Tool Tips Students Learn : That they have control over how much they charge for their product. In this example, and extra dollar will mean approximately $120,000 extra revenue. Would an extra $120,000 in advertising make up for any lost sales? Could they get away with $100,000 in extra advertising, and make an increased profit? Should they follow a high-price high-advertising strategy, or a low-price low-advertising one? Would the same strategy work in all markets?
25	Boardroom Tool Tips Students Learn : That they have control over how much spend on monthly advertising. Smart students will look at the “marketing” page to see what other players are doing about the price/ advertising mix. Even smarter students will look at the financial reports to see which companies are making the most money, and what strategies they are following.
26	Boardroom Tool Tips Students Learn : That they have control over how much of the company profits they pay out in dividends. If a company needs money for expansion - for example to buy more factories, it should retain a higher proportion of profits. If it has no plans for expansion, or if it has plenty of cash, it should disburse this money to the shareholders. Of course, as a shareholder, each player will benefit from higher dividend payouts and have more money to invest in the share market.
27	Pop Quiz Students have a “Pop Quiz” to complete during the game
28	Setting up the Game Go to www.businessmanagementgames.com/standard Or www.businessmanagementgames.com/yourschoolsname If you have been allocated a “school name” by BMG
29	Setting up the Game Click on “Controllers”
30	Setting up the Game BMG will provide you with a password
31	Setting up the Game Click “Ok”
32	Setting up the Game The Game is now running.
33	Setting up the Game If you “Suspend” the game, you will arrive at this screen, from where you may resume, or start a new game. Note also the option to compete against other schools.
34	Setting up the Game Students go to www.businessmanagementgames.com/standard
35	Setting up the Game Students click on “Students” to log on
36	Setting up the Game Students whose computer crashes may pick up where they left off at “Re-Log On”
37	Setting up the Game Students who wish to team up with an existing player may also use the “Re-Log On” and their team-mates player identity