About the role
About the Event
Businesses of every size face challenge that affect their growth, efficiency, and financial health. These may include declining sales, rising expenses, cash flow gaps, ineffective inventory management, customer retention issues, or difficulty deciding where to allocate limited resources. Understanding such challenges requires the ability to connect business information with clear, practical decisions.
The Finance & Business Analytics Challenge invites participants to step into the role of business problem-solvers. Through a set of real-world business problem statements, teams will use Microsoft Excel to organise information, identify patterns, create meaningful visualisations, and build an interactive Excel dashboard that helps explain the business situation. Each team will then develop a practical solution and communicate how it can help the business address its challenge.
The event focuses on the effective use of data and dashboards to understand business problems and support better decisions—not on complex financial modelling or advanced calculations.
Objectives
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Encourage participants to identify and understand practical business challenges with a finance and analytics perspective. -
Promote the effective use of Microsoft Excel to organise, analyse, and present business data. -
Develop the ability to convert data into clear insights through interactive Excel dashboards and relevant performance indicators. -
Encourage practical, realistic, and data-supported business solutions. -
Strengthen problem-solving, teamwork, communication, and presentation skills. -
Demonstrate how business analytics can support better monitoring, planning, and decision-making.
Competition Format
The competition will consist of two rounds. Teams will first develop a dashboard-based solution for one selected business problem. Shortlisted teams will then pitch that same solution to the judging panel.
Round 1: Dashboard Development & Business Solution
Participants will be provided with a pool of approximately 5 real-world business problem statements. Each team will select one problem statement and work on it using Microsoft Excel.
Teams will be expected to:
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Understand the assigned business scenario and clearly identify the main problem the business is facing. -
Use the information and data provided to organise relevant business information in Microsoft Excel. -
Create an interactive Excel dashboard that presents the business situation in a clear and meaningful way. -
Select relevant indicators or KPIs that help track the problem and understand the business's performance. -
Use dashboard insights to identify areas that need attention and explain what the data reveals. -
Recommend a practical business solution and show how the dashboard can help the business monitor progress.
Round 1 Submission
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A completed Excel file containing the organised data and supporting work. -
An interactive Excel dashboard relevant to the selected business problem. -
A concise explanation of the identified problem, key dashboard insights, and proposed solution.
Presentation mode: Shortlisted teams may deliver their five-minute presentation either online or offline. Teams opting for an offline presentation will present at Jaipuria Institute of Management, Lucknow.
Round 2: Business Solution Pitch
Shortlisted teams will present the same business solution developed in Round 1 before the judging panel. Each team will have five minutes to pitch its solution. The pitch should be focused, engaging, and supported by the dashboard created in the first round.
The presentation should communicate:
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The business problem and why it matters. -
The key insights revealed through the Excel analysis and dashboard. -
A brief demonstration of the dashboard and its most useful features. -
The proposed solution and how it addresses the identified problem. -
How the business can use the dashboard to monitor the situation and make better decisions.
The objective is to assess how effectively teams can explain their findings, demonstrate the value of their dashboard, and convince the judges that their proposed solution is practical and useful.
Illustrative Business Problem Areas
The event will offer approximately 5 distinct business problem statements. These will be based on realistic business situations across different sectors, allowing teams to work on varied challenges. Illustrative areas may include:
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Cash Flow Visibility: A growing business struggles to keep track of money coming in and going out, making it difficult to understand its cash position. -
Rising Operating Expenses: A business is experiencing an increase in operating expenses and needs to identify where costs are rising. -
Declining Profitability: A company is generating sales but is unable to understand which products, services, or business areas are affecting its profitability. -
Sales Performance: A business wants to understand sales trends across products, regions, stores, or sales teams. -
Inventory Management: A retailer faces excess stock in some categories and frequent stock-outs in others. -
Receivables Management: A business is facing delays in customer payments and needs better visibility into outstanding dues. -
Branch or Store Performance: A business with multiple locations wants to compare performance and identify underperforming branches. -
Customer Retention: A service business is experiencing customer drop-offs and wants to understand patterns in customer activity. -
Budget Monitoring: A business wants a simple way to compare planned spending with actual spending and identify areas requiring attention. -
Business Expansion Tracking: A business planning to expand wants to monitor the performance of its existing operations and understand key indicators before taking the next step.
Use of Technology
Microsoft Excel will be the primary tools used in the competition. Participants should use them in a practical and purposeful manner, with the dashboard serving as the central output of their work.
Microsoft Excel
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Organising, cleaning, and structuring the data provided. -
Using formulas, tables, filters, and pivot tables where relevant. -
Summarising business information and preparing data for visualisation. -
Supporting the dashboard with clear and well-organised source data. -
Building an interactive Excel dashboard using relevant business data. -
Presenting key indicators through clear charts, cards, tables, and visuals. -
Allowing users to explore information through filters and interactive elements. -
Highlighting trends, comparisons, exceptions, and areas that require attention. -
Making business information easier to understand and use for decision-making.