Show me your budget and I can tell you how you spend your time, where you focus your resources, and what you believe are the greatest priorities for your church and programs.

Think about your personal spending. If you showed me your latest bank statement or credit card bills, I would be able to tell you how you spend your time and where you focus your personal resources. All I would have to do is take your income and expenses for the statement period and assign categories to the ones we see repeated.

For example, I may see expenses for great restaurants (dining), a gym membership (fitness), doctor visits or medications (medical), and ticket purchases for shows and concerts (entertainment).

On the incoming side, I may see a check deposit from your job (salary). If you provided two or three months of data, I would have a good idea about how you prioritize resources.

Tip 6:  The budget is a reflection of your pastoral priorities

The same can be said of your church priorities. What are the categories of income and spending that the parish receives and spends? Most likely, the largest income category for the church includes offertory collections while staff salary and benefits drive the majority of expenses. These categories make sense as priorities. Without collection income, the church would have virtually no resources to operate besides savings or any endowments. Salary and benefits also make sense because of the need for the most critical resource for any organization—people to accomplish the work.

This makes analyzing the next categories of spending very important. After salary and benefits, what is the next highest level of spending? And next? And next? This is when budget analysis can really help determine a way forward (More on this topic later in the week).

There is no doubt that church leaders are busy people, so the next step in the process is to take the data that has been collected and focus your time. Focusing on the “right” areas of the budget means prioritizing your time so that you spend the greatest amount of effort in those areas that will provide the most significant benefits. A nice tool to deploy during this phase of the process is to calculate the Budget Category Impact Percentage (BCIP). Tomorrow, we will discuss how to calculate the BCIP!

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The one financial related shelf document I’d like you to have is our book, Parish Finance — otherwise, your church budget should be in your desk, not on your shelf! I am joking about the book, but not about the budget!

Tip 8: Keep the church budget at your desk, and not on a shelf!

Often, the budget is prepared, discussed, approved by a Finance Council or Vestry, and entered into the accounting system. After the fiscal year starts, budget reports are generated either monthly or worse, quarterly.

However, there is a problem. Budget reporting and review processes often miss the most important value-add that the budget brings to an organization. Along with being the plan for revenues and expenses, a budget should be used as an active management tool to review whether church finances are aligning to the pastoral priorities outlined in the budget development process.

The question I’d like you to consider is, “How is the budget used as a tool and not just a monthly revenue and expense report?”

Most budget reports show a series of columns that usually include at least the budget plan and actuals for a given time period. When budget management is merely mechanical, it loses the most important power of budgeting – helping you manage priorities!  

As the pastoral leader, I am not (necessarily) recommending that you need to check the budget every day, but, at least at regular intervals, answer the question, “Is the budget meeting the priorities we outlined when we created it?” 

Stay Tuned – More to come on this topic when we discuss budget execution and control in the coming weeks!

Questions/Comments? Email Mike Castrilli at mjcastrilli@gmail.com!

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“Sorry, it’s not in the budget.” This is not a terrible response in and of itself, the problem is when the budget is used often as a penalty stick or prison.

To some people, the budget is used as a weapon of passive aggressive destruction.

“Well, the church budget committee doesn’t meet until 2023. Sorry, you are out of luck.”

As we have discussed, budgets are not created for constraint, but to offer freedom. A budget is a management tool that allows you the freedom to connect resources to mission priorities. 

The budget is also not to be used as a weapon —  it is a plan that offers leaders and organizations the insights they need to make informed financial decisions. Yes, the budget offers parameters on how much you expect to receive and to spend. But, the budget is also a GPS to help direct you to your destination. However, as we all know, directions are only as good as the person driving. The driver must be able to adjust for conditions on the ground – weather, road closures, accidents. The budget can offer this flexibility.

In fact, the budget empowers effective decision-making by providing directions for saying “yes” or “no” as circumstances arise. But, the budget should never be used as a simple way to say “no”  because someone has not taken the time to establish priorities and create a resource plan that is collaborative, transparent, and reflects the needs of the organization.

When the budget is used as an excuse, leaders risk losing the trust, credibility, and morale of those they lead.

Developed and executed well, the budget is never a negative excuse — it’s a positive reality.

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