Public Sector Budgeting and Accounting

18-20 February 2013

Next date: 7-9 April 2014

only for participants in the Certificate in Public Financial Management and Methods

This course gives an overview of the basic concepts and practices of budgeting, accounting and other parts of financial management and management control. Students develop the analytical and operational skills to analyse different kinds of budgets and to understand a public sector organisation from a budgetary perspective. The course covers the entire budgetary process, including budget formulation and execution, programme development, cost- and revenue estimation, budget tactics, and budget evaluation. Students also gain some basic understanding of public sector accounting concepts, particularly by learning and practicing the main content and structure of the income statement, the balance sheet and the cash flow statement, including their interrelationships. Examples from a range of public sector experiences are woven into the course to illustrate the issues involved and to examine the connections between financial control systems and the purposes of an organisation.

A major part of the course deals with current trends in modernising financial management systems in the public sector. The participants get acquainted to concepts such as accrual accounting, budget flexibilisation or managerial cost accounting. By learning about international trends and specific reform projects from German-speaking countries, students get a deeper understanding of current challenges in developing and implementing financial management reforms. Furthermore, they discuss the relevance of reform concepts with regard to the specifics of the German public administration context. Several case studies give participants the opportunity to discuss issues of implementation and of the use of financial management concepts.

Convenor