CFO Magazine: Opinion: Zero-Based Budgeting Emphasizes Growth, Cost-Cutting

“The real power of ZBB is not in achieving cost-cutting benchmarks; it lies in combining digital budgeting tools with greater cost accountability and a process that links budgeting discipline to future growth.”

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SF Magazine: CFO to CFO: Budgeting to Fund Strategic Plans

“It starts with finance being a business partner across the organization. For us, the finance organization isn’t on the sideline, waiting to be called in to the game; they’re on the field, part of running the plays that are called. And with that, there’s a clear partnership with our operations, commercial, and technical colleagues, which makes it a lot easier to inform the decision-making process.”

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CFO Magazine: Cycle Time to Complete the Annual Budget: Metric of the Month

“Based on data from more than 3,900 organizations in our Open Standards Benchmarking survey for Planning and Management Accounting, APQC finds that top performers complete the annual budget in 25 days or less — half the time it takes organizations in the 75th percentile.”

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CFO Dive: Driver-Based Budgeting Touted for Integrating Financial and Operational Planning

“Driver-based budgeting links real resources and activities to your budget, and most FP&A organizations are striving to achieve that. From my perspective, it really acknowledges that the budget is the articulation of a series of operational items or activities. It’s different from traditional budgeting in that it shifts the focus to outcomes, and that’s ultimately how you drive your annual budget.”

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SF Magazine: Budgeting Revisited

6 things to consider when innovating your budget:

1. Corporate Culture

2. Comprehensive Approach

3. Strategy & Scenario Planning

4. Relative Target Setting

5. Compensation System

6. Flexible Planning

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SF Magazine: Strategies for Global Operations

“A well-designed, functional, and comprehensive budgeting system is an essential management tool for a multinational business. As we discussed, these companies must forecast the impact of global external variables (like foreign exchange and interest rates) as well as internal variables (transfer prices, supply-sourcing subsidiaries, production sites, etc.). All in all, the budgeting system should be effective not only in monitoring progress compared to plan but also in adjusting to unpredictable events and circumstances.”

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SF Magazine: Managing International Operations in Uncertain Times

“It’s also evident that foreign currency exchange rates, interest rates, and inflation inherently carry an element of uncertainty and volatility, which represents risks that financial professionals must manage in order to better forecast, monitor, and control the performance of their organization’s international business operations.”

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CFO Dive: Zero-based budgeting makes a comeback, but it’s different this time

“A ZBB-like review of expenses can lead to better analysis of the activities that support the customer,” Bryan Lapidus said. “This could be a huge value-add to the business by helping to assess profitability of products and services accurately, and be more meaningful than simply reading down the list of contracts in a general ledger.”

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FP&A Trends: Let Traditional Budgeting be a Victim of this Pandemic

“Instead of annual forecasts of things that cannot be predicted or controlled, with December 31 as the fictitious deadline, companies should monitor the reality on a regular basis and work more with trend analyses and unbiased (mathematical) forecasts.”

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