Submitted by DrMaltz on
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I recently joined a new company. We're in the middle of budget season. The person I'm replacing is transitioning into a nother group. We're a technology company and my new job is responsible for managing all software purchased and used by our organization. Well, i've only been here for 3 days and budgets due and this guy is not giving a wealth of detail on what apps, hosted apps, data subscriptions, magazines subs, etc.. we should have in our dept. What is the best way to go about identifying all the things necessary for the budget to make sure I'm not clobbered next year for not covering properly? Any info you can provide would be helpful.
--Drmaltz
Transition Not going as expected
Get more information. You'll want all previous budgets, at least going back a few years, as well as actuals for this year and the previous, so you can get an idea of the level of slippage/cutting at the firm.
Then talk to the bean counter you turn budgets over to. (Controller? Business manager? CFO?) and get some guidance on how to proceed. Same with your boss. They might be all right with just putting a general "I've only been here for three days" allocation to handle any missteps. They might also be able to put pressure on the person you've replaced to work through it with you in detail.
Transition Not going as expected
Nik had good advice and I want to add this years purchases.
Any purchases made in the last year are probalby covered by a warranty that is going to expire so get a payables report to see when software was bought and plan for it to expire about the same time next year.
Use previous budget and add 10% because they will probably cut you back anyhow. Also, software companies charge anywhere from 10 - 20% for yearly maintenance. You can usually negiotiate a better price.
What do you do for new purchases?