Financial Management for Project Managers Cheat Sheet 2026

The 30 highest-yield Financial Management for Project Managers facts, distilled from real exam questions. Print it, save it as a PDF, or study it here — free, no sign-up.

1. Which EVM reporting document summarizes cost and schedule performance metrics at all levels of the WBS for management review? → Cost Performance Report (CPR)
2. Which of the following is a need for the examination of product profitability? → Accurate revenue and expense data
3. Gross profit on an income statement is calculated as: → Net sales minus cost of goods sold
4. Which of the following is not a prerequisite for a risk that can, in theory, be insured? → losses should be catastrophic in nature
5. Which financial planning practice helps a project manager identify the point at which cumulative project costs will be recovered by cumulative project revenues? → Break-even analysis
6. Which is "Waste in relation to material cost?" → Smoke
7. A project budget at completion (BAC) is $200,000. The project is 40% complete. What is the Planned Value (PV) if the project is on schedule? → $80,000
8. On the balance sheet, retained earnings represent: → Cumulative net income kept in the business after dividends
9. Which capital budgeting technique calculates the time required for cumulative project cash inflows to equal the initial investment? → Payback Period
10. An incremental cash flow in capital budgeting refers to: → Cash flows that occur only if the project is undertaken
11. Which system assigns numeric or mnomenic codes to parts? → Symbolic
12. What can you say about residual income? → The amount of money left over after a person's monthly bills are paid.
13. Real options in capital budgeting give project managers the right to: → Expand, delay, or abandon a project based on future information
14. In relation to "Spoilage," which of the following accounting treatments is correct? → All of these.
15. Bottom-up cost estimating involves: → Estimating costs at the work package level and summing them up
16. indicates the amount that customers owe to a business as a result of buying products or services. → accounts receivable
17. Business investor funds are an example. → cash inflow
18. Planned Value (PV) in EVM represents: → The budgeted cost of work scheduled to be done by a specific point in time
19. Life cycle costing in project financial management considers: → Total costs including acquisition, operation, maintenance, and disposal
20. Following the completion of a client profitability study, → All answers are correct
21. The discount rate used in NPV analysis for a project is most commonly the: → Weighted Average Cost of Capital (WACC)
22. What can be monitored by a non-profit organization using a balanced scorecard? → Supporters
23. The balanced scorecard is utilized because... → To determine what the business finds important to ensure it reaches its goals.
24. The terminal (salvage) value in a capital budgeting analysis represents: → The after-tax proceeds from disposing of project assets at end of life
25. Cost Variance (CV) in EVM is calculated as: → EV - AC
26. In EVM reporting, a cumulative CPI that falls below 1.0 early in the project is significant because: → Research shows CPI rarely improves significantly as the project progresses
27. Item placement that can accidentally swap items is → Family grouping
28. Why is this firm's cash rising? → There is more cash inflow compared to outflows
29. Which is not a cash-flow forecast use? → They indicate how much profit the business will make
30. Accounting records that show how much a business owes creditors for goods bought on credit → accounts payable