What is the Business of the Business?

In order to justify a budget, the business needs to know that the money will be spent on efforts to achieve desirable outcomes. In other words, know what you want to do then spend money on doing just that. Going back to consultant blather: define your organisational mission then budget to satisfy that mission.

Let's imagine that times are tight. Perhaps there's some sort of global financial crisis going on. For whatever reason, you decide that you need to spend less money. Where do you cut your budget?

Do you need new -- lateral -- thinking for your own problems? email nick leth at gmail dot com. Need solutions? No worries. Now.

The area to reduce budgets is, anywhere that money is spent that does not support the organisational mission.

The links are broken

From the Health Department website: "Western Australia's public health system aims to ensure healthier, longer and better lives for all Western Australians and to protect the health of our community by providing a safe, high quality, accountable and sustainable health care system." (http://www.health.wa.gov.au/about/)

Write that on a whiteboard. Draw a circle round it. Think. How do we satisfy that mission?

"The six strategic directions or priority areas WA Health follows are: Healthy Workforce, Healthy Hospitals, Healthy Partnerships, Healthy Communities, Healthy Resources and Healthy Leadership." Write each of those on the whiteboard. Draw a circle round each. Draw a line between the first circle -- the mission statement -- and each of these six priority areas. Now we're starting to understand Health. For example:

Link the Healthy Workforce circle out to the next relevant statement, "Our health system workforce is the foundation of the delivery of health care..." This expands out to several aims and commitments. And then the published explanation ends. Let's look behind the scenes, to the land of endless possibilities...

"We commit to: Developing and deploying a statewide strategic workforce plan." Who is this "We"? Rather, who is actually developing and deploying? If there is a group within Health that has been told, "Develop and deploy a statewide workforce plan," then that group is essential to the mission of Health. If the government decides to scrap that particular commitment then that group may safely be sacked... Sorry... Their budget for development and deployment may be reduced to zero.

Who else is essential for this particular commitment?

Start drawing more circles and lines... Perhaps there is a need to document statewide workforce needs? Link it in to the mission statement. Identify who does that documentation. Give them a budget. Or, if the basic commitment goes, reduce that budget to zero.

Will we develop the plan through extensive consultation, or by central decree? Add the appropriately labelled and linked circles, link the circles to the people and groups required to do the work, budget accordingly. Does "workforce" include health professionals? internal and external professionals? support and ancillary staff? accountants, administrators and managers? Make the decisions, determine the scale of the effort, identify people and groups to do the work. Budget accordingly.

The key requirement is to link each and every commitment, direction, key area, task... to the people and resources required to do it. Then develop a budget.

If you want to cut dollars from the budget, look at the links back to essential commitments, back to the mission statement for the organisation. Which commitment will you cut? That is where you can reduce the budget.

Independent thinking & independent analysis of your problems by Agamedes Consulting. Support for your thought: email nick leth at gmail dot com