Example Of Government Financial Administration Essay

Government Financial Administration: Stages of Budgeting, and Public Policy

There are generally 4 stages in the budgeting process: preparation, approval, execution and auditing. Each of these parts is necessary to the entire process. Most importantly, the relationship between public policy is reflected in each of these stages. This paper provides an overview of these four stages, as well as how the said relationship between budget and public policy is manifested in each of the stages.

Planning

The process of planning a budget starts several months before the end of the current fiscal year. In the next fiscal year, the focus turns to the following fiscal year’s budget. Planning the budget takes into consideration the organizational strategic plan; that is, what the organization wants to do and how (the mission, objectives and programs needed to achieve these). The budget process is about allocating the right share of resources (financial, human, etc.) to each of the processes that will need to be undertaken towards meeting the organization’s strategic plan. To ensure fair allocation of resources, the planning process examines how much the organization needs to meet its goals and objectives within a fiscal year. In this regard, the organization considers its sources of revenue and expenses.
The reason that the panning process starts many months before the fiscal year begins is because it involves many stages of consideration and deliberation. For instance, after strategic planning, the top management (including the executive director) starts to discuss the budget of the following year with key staff. These discussions cover the successes and failures of last fiscal year’s programs. These consultations are information-gathering processes, and accurate information is key to effective budgeting. Finally, the draft budget is made.
In terms of public policy, because this is taxpayers’ money being spent, the government must involve as many stakeholders as possible, including interest groups that stand in on behalf of the citizens.

Approval

After the executive director and finance committees have agreed on a draft budget, they present it to the board (the legislature for government budgets) for approval. The draft budget must: tie the proposed budget to the organization’s strategic planning (mission, objectives and programs); reflect al financial items the organization expects during the following fiscal year; project surpluses and deficits for the program; be in the format that the board has agreed to or makes it easy for the board to understand; show the budgeting process (centralized or decentralized); show a clarity of the budgeting process calendar, etc. The presentation, in this regard, must communicate to the board clearly to avoid surprises.
The board of directors reviews the draft budget and considers the presentation, and decides whether it is okay or still needs to address some changes. Often, the board does not approve the budget forthright. In this regard, the executive director and his/her return to the drawing board and make the changes proposed by the board. Finally, if the board is satisfied with the budget, they approve it.
The approval process might also involve involving some interest groups, who can provide feedback as to whether the budget addresses their problems.

Execution

This is the implementation stage and comes after the board approves the budget. This involves the executive director discussing with the finance officer and other key staff members how to implement the budget. It also involves meeting the various program directors to discuss both the revenue and expense sides of their budgets.
The finance director is a key player in the implementation process as he/she monitors the revenue and expense flows. He/she is the one that allocates funds to the various programs under the direction of the executive director, who continues to monitor the implementation process. This monitoring process involves meetings and reports. There are generally three types of reports. The variance report tracks the revenues and expenses over regular periods (weekly, monthly, bimonthly, etc.). The cash-flow management report tracks the liquidity of the organization. Finally, the performance report tracks the performance of each program vis-à-vis the budget allocated to them.
Reporting is part of ensuring transparency throughout the implementation process. This is an important aspect of public policy. All these reports must be cited in the auditing stage.

Auditing

Auditing is the last stag and comes at the end of the fiscal year. It is the stage of accountability, when the implementation process is reviewed to ensure that no resources were wasted. It is also the stage where the budget process is reviewed for problems in preparation for the next fiscal year, including which programs need to be allocated more resources the following fiscal year and which ones can be done away with entirely. Although this may be done in-house (that is, it can be done internally), it is also important to have outside experts offer second opinions. Besides, external experts are not likely to be as biased as internal auditors.
As already noted, the government must account for public expenditure. In this regard, the government should account for its expenditures. This helps avoid corruption and other resource wastages.