Zusammenfassung der Ressource
ZERO BASED
BUDGETING (ZBB)
- A method of budgeting in which all
expenses must be justified for each new
period.
- Zero-based budgeting starts
from a "zero base" and every
function within an organization is
analyzed for its needs and costs.
- Budgets are then built around
what is needed for the upcoming
period, regardless of whether the
budget is higher or lower than
the previous one.
- MERITS
- Inefficient or obsolete
operations can be identified
and discontinued
- ZBB leads to increased staff
involvement at all levels
since a lot more information
and work is required to
complete the budget
- It responds to
changes in the
business
environment
- Knowledge and
understanding of the
cost behaviour
patterns of the
organisation will be
enhanced
- Resources should
be allocated
efficiently and
economically
- DEMERITS
- Shortermism
- It emphasises
shortterm benefits to
the detriment of
longterm goals.
- Limted
flexibility
- The budgeting process may become
too rigid and the organisation may not
be able to react to unforeseen
opportunities or threats
- Since decisions are made at budget time,
managers may feel unable to react to
changes that occur during the year. This
could have a detrimental effect on the
business if it fails to react to emerging
opportunities and threats.
- Too much
technical
exercise
- The management skills
required may not be
present
- Departmental managers will not have the skills necessary to
construct decision packages. They will need training for this
and training takes time and money.
- Time consuming
- Managers may feel demotivated due
to the large amount of time spent on
the budgeting process
- The process of identifying decision
packages, determining their purpose,
costs and benefits is massively time
consuming and therefore costly.
- Qualitative
barriers
- Ranking can be difficult for different types
of activities or where the benefits are
qualitative in nature
- Ranking the packages can be difficult, since many activities
cannot be compared on the basis of purely quantitative
measures. Qualitative factors need to be incorporated but this
is difficult.
- Huge paper
work have to
be done
- In a large organisation, the
number of activities will be so
large that the amount of
paperwork generated from ZBB
will be unmanageable.
- Without approval, the
budget allowance is
zero’
- Steps in ZBB
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- The resources are
then allocated to the
various packages.
- Priority i given to high ranking decision
packages when allocating the resources
- Ranking of the
Decision
packages
- Each decision package is
evaluated and ranked usually
using cost/benefit analysis.
- The must do activities are readily
approved ,activities under the discretion of
the management are ranked based on VFM
from each activity
- Each of the individual
activities is then described in a
decision package.
- The decision package should state the costs
and revenues expected from the given activity.
It should be drawn up in such a way that the
package can be evaluated and ranked against
other packages.
- What is a
Decison
Package
- A document that identifies and
describes a specific activity in such a
manner that senior management can:
- (a) evaluate and rank it
against other activities
competing for limited
resources, and
- (b) decide whether
to approve or
disapprove it.’
- A decision
package is a
document that:
- analyses the cost of the
activity (costs may be built
up from a zero base, but
costing information can be
obtained from historical
records or last year’s
budget)
- states the
purpose of the
activity
- Identifies alternative
methods of achieving
the same purpose
- assesses the consequence of not
doing the activity at all, or
performing the activity at a
different level
- establishes
measures of
performance for the
activity.
- Types of
decision
packages
- Mutually exclusive packages: these
contain different methods of
obtaining the same objective.
- Incremental packages: these divide the activity
into a number of different levels of activity. The
base package describes the minimum effort and
cost needed to carry out the activity. The other
packages describe the incremental costs and
benefits when added to the base.
- Managers should specify, for
their responsibility centres,
those activities that can be
individually evaluated.