iwow assisted Upplands Väsby municipality in creating a more unified and efficient process for budgeting and forecasting. iwow led the effort to develop a list of requirements for the system demonstrations that were conducted.
The municipality of Upplands Väsby faced challenges with its budget and forecast processes, which lacked a unified structure. These processes varied depending on the department involved, leading to several issues:
- Personalized and complex Excel templates
- Difficult financial compilations and limited comparability of information
The main goal of the project was to create a more uniform and efficient process for budgeting and forecasting within the municipality. This would enable all managers to perform their budgeting and forecasting tasks more quickly and accurately, thereby improving the municipality’s financial planning and decision-making.
In the initial phase, the current processes and IT support were mapped to analyze the present state. This served as the basis for developing a proposal for the desired future state and evaluating potential system solutions.
To streamline the budgeting and forecasting processes in Upplands Väsby municipality, the following key principles and guidelines were identified:
The budget process should dictate the process support, not vice versa: It was emphasized that the budget process itself should be the guiding factor in designing the tools and systems used. The tools should be tailored to support and facilitate the budgeting work according to established processes, rather than forcing the process to adapt to the IT system.
All units should use the same standardized system: A key principle was that all departments within the municipality should utilize the same standardized system for budgeting and forecasting. This ensures consistency and enables comparability across different departments and divisions.
Units follow common guidelines, but not all elements are mandatory: While all units were expected to adhere to shared guidelines and principles for the budgeting process, it was recognized that different units might have varying needs and requirements. Therefore, not all elements of the process were mandatory for every unit.
Clear role descriptions: It was highlighted that clear role descriptions should be established to clarify responsibilities for different parts of the budgeting work. These roles included controllers, unit managers, and system administrators. It should be clearly defined when responsibilities were individual and when they were shared.
Status tracking to monitor progress: A status tracking mechanism was proposed to monitor the progress of different units in the budgeting process.
Export capability for budget data to other tools: Finally, the ability to export budget data from the budgeting tool to other relevant data tools was deemed essential to facilitate reporting and information sharing.