Budjetinhallinto

Budjetinhallinto is the Finnish term for budget management, the process of planning, allocating, executing, and controlling an organization's resources through budgets and forecasts. It covers budgeting, financial planning, performance monitoring, and reporting to ensure alignment with strategy and compliance.

The main purpose is to translate strategic goals into financial plans, support decision making, manage liquidity, control costs, and provide accountability. It enables performance measurement through variance analysis and scenario planning.

Core elements include budgeting (setting revenue and expense targets and capital allocations), forecasting (revised projections), variance analysis (actual vs budget), cost control (cost centers and spending policies), and reporting to management and stakeholders.

The budgeting cycle typically includes planning and target setting, budget preparation, consolidation and approval, execution and monitoring, periodic reporting, and review. Modern practice commonly uses ERP and budgeting software, along with dashboards for real-time insight.

Common approaches are incremental budgeting, zero-based budgeting, rolling forecasts, and performance budgeting, with variations between private companies and public sector institutions. In Finland, emphasis may be placed on procurement controls and regulatory compliance.

Roles include budget owners (department heads), the finance function (controller, treasurer), senior management, and auditors. Clear governance, approvals, and version control are essential.

Challenges include data quality, forecast accuracy, alignment with strategy, coordination across units, and change management. Best practices involve integrating budgeting with strategic planning, maintaining transparent assumptions, scenario analysis, and automated reporting.

See also Budget, Budgeting, Financial management, Variance analysis, Performance management.