My friends are stuck in the budget spin
It's something strange that happens to my usually social friends in the fall and winter. Why can't they get on the important football game? Why do they miss the nice wine tasting on Friday night? Why do they no longer respond to mail?
The answer is often the same: "I'm struggling with the budget". They are stuck in the budget spin. A process that they start planning for already on the beach in July and August and which then seems to fill days, evenings and weekends from the trees starting to turn yellow in September until the mulled and lice cats arrive in December.
They often tell me that "the budget does not go together".
But the strange thing about the game "the budget does not go together" is that it can apparently be solved just by recalculating and calculating correctly. For example, by changing the internal trading model or forecasting market growth to 4,15%, instead of 3,76%, in the Excel model. However, they seem to talk quite a bit about activities, actions, goals, visions and long-term choices.
My goal this Christmas is to invite my poor friends to some mulled wine and homemade lice - before rushing back to their workplaces to, after the financial statements, make the first revision of the budget for the board meeting in January. Obviously, customers had not realized that the market would grow 4,15% according to the calculation in my friend's Excel template.
Why are they doing this? It is hardly for their own high pleasure. It wouldn't be like my friends.
Maybe I would take the lice tax by telling them that there are other ways? After all, it is not business critical to spend a quarter of each year developing the perfectly balanced, but ultimately totally erroneous budget. However, that time had been well spent on implementing activities and actions, advancing towards goals, developing visions and making long-term choices.