FreeBalance conducts internal Financial Management Information System (FMIS) implementation audits. The process has been perfected over time with over 100 performance indicators.
The strategic inflection point for transformation in the enterprise software market was the point where economies of scale changed to favour nimble over bloated enterprise software companies. There are important lessons to be learnt in why and how this happened.
At around 20% of total country employment, and 15% of annual GDP in wage bills, salary budget scrutiny, risk management, and spending predictability is critical in government.
FreeBalance has been involved in PFM reform in developing countries for decades. In our experience, the good practices are more effective than blindly following ‘best practices’.
So, how can governments modernize procurement to improve FMIS success rates when developing Requests for Proposals (RFPs)? Our experience recommends that governments should question FMIS procurement practices that are based on the rationale that this is ‘how it has always been done’ and address ‘risky’ risk management as follows:
GRP solutions such as the FreeBalance Accountability Suite™ are used to automate financial functions in government and provide a set of tools that are used by civil servants whose capabilities either improve or reduce government effectiveness. This has positive or negative effects that are exposed in measures like credit ratings, the Corruption Perception Index and other important composite indicators like World Governance Indicators.
Public procurement is the main driver of government operations. Globally, governments spend $13 trillion a year on public procurement contracts. For every $3 of public spending, $1 goes to private contractors tasked with implementing government projects. Public procurement can account for around 13% to 15% of GDP. This means that a good public procurement process … Continued
We would like to extend concepts introduced in the paper through the lens of enterprise software technology and implementation practices with a few recommendations.
V4M (Value for Money), is in many ways, the public sector equivalent of ROI (Return on Investment). However, there is no bottom line in the public sector. Governments have mandates and need to optimize outputs, outcomes and impact. V4M provides a methodology for doing so.
The challenges of implementing financial management systems in government and integrating these systems with the latest technology to support results-based budgeting requires an understanding of the changed context that governments find themselves in.
Government operational and fiscal decentralization leads to improved local decision-making, infrastructure development and service delivery, however, many countries struggle to achieve the benefits of decentralization, delegation, and devolution.
Using a balanced scorecard method for government performance management can help public sectors simplify complexities of performance management. Read more.
