Setting budgets

What is budget setting? 

Budget setting is the ability to effectively plan, allocate, and control financial resources to achieve strategic objectives.

In the context of transformation, this includes the setting of project and programme budgets, ensuring alignment to Medium Term Financial Plan (MTFP), taking into consideration cost modelling, saving targets and the tracking of benefits realisation.

Knowledge

• Knowledge of public finance regulations, council constitution including the scheme of delegation.
• Understanding of cost of delivery, operational pressures, performance, and outcomes.
• Understanding of inflation, and wider economic factors that impact cost or funding.
• Understanding of public sector budget setting and management best practice.
• Understanding of project and programme management methodologies.

Skills

Able to:

• Think strategically: Aligning budgetary provision to the achievement of desired outcomes.
• Analyse current and previous year service budgets: To understand where any budget variances occurred and why.
• Apply technical financial knowledge: Calculating the appropriate inflation, pay award and wider economic forecasts, applying to the base budgets appropriately, building in savings targets in alignment with evidence-led benefits modelling, linking all financials back to the MTFP.
• Engage with stakeholders: To understand operational service pressures, which may need to be factored into the budget and seek approval through the scheme of delegation hierarchy.
• Problem solve: Reviewing the budget and the overall position of the council, working creatively with Finance and service colleagues to adjust the budget and / or plans to balance with revenue and capital funding streams,
• Think critically: When reviewing transformation project and programme budgets, ensuring cost modelling is accurate and funding mechanisms are in line with public finance regulations.
• Report the final budget: Document the process by which the budget has been arrived at, the assumptions associated with it and develop a report for review and sign off through the appropriate governance mechanism(s)
• Maintain the budget within systems: Work with colleagues to build each budget within the financial system to ensure a baseline budget is created from which actual and forecast spend can be monitored on an ongoing basis.
• Manage risk: Identify, assess and stress test the risks associated with transformation budgets to understand individual financial risks and risks in combination. Apply appropriate mitigation to maintain financial risk within the council risk appetite.

Behaviours

Behaviours associated with finance for transformation require team members to be: