Welcome to my newsletter “Behind the Numbers”.

A fortnightly newsletter where I share tips for Budget Owners on how to run your budget more effectively. I may also share an interesting sporting stat along the way.

For those of you who know my story you’ll get why numbers and sport are so much part of who I am.

Own Your Budget – The best budget questions to ask

For the majority of budget owners in an organisation, you will be reading your budget reports for the month of April early next week. Some of you may have received them already.

Followed by the question that many budget owners dread:

Can you send through some commentary that explains the variance to budget for the month?

You want to investigate but you don’t know where to start. The temptation is to use the commentary from last month so as to keep the Finance department off your back.

“What did we say last month?”

Does this sound familiar?

Here are a couple of questions that every budget owner should be asking when they receive their monthly budget reports:

What is our monthly number excluding adjustments?

Traditional monthly reports are a lagging measure. “We completed that work 3 months ago. Why are we seeing those costs now?”

Linking data to current month activity will increase visibility. Which will help you explain any budget variations.

How does that compare to last month?

As discussed in the last newsletter, it doesn’t take long for your budget targets to become obsolete. Try and compare with a more relevant number. And start to focus on trends.

Own your budget so it doesn’t own you.

PS: Want to start understanding what your budget is about? When you are ready, let’s have a chat.

One sporting stat

Australian cricketer Jake Fraser-McGurk has been a revelation in the T20 Indian Premier League. On average, batters are trying to hit a boundary 39% of the time. Fraser-McGurk is trying to do this 74% of the time.

But it still wasn’t enough to get him a spot in the Australian T20 squad for the World Cup to be played in the West Indies and USA next month.

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