September is an exciting time. Sparks of Fall are beginning to appear, football is finally back, and Labor Day provides a long weekend. The scary part about September and October is not Halloween but the intense preparation and planning cycles to solidify next year’s budget. 

So, I am sure you are currently planning for next year’s budget. This means you need to plan out the events you would like to put on and attend, headcount for your team, and what software programs you need to maintain and improve your process in 2020.  Creating and presenting a budget isn’t an easy task, though. If you don’t nail it, one of two things will happen:

You underestimate your budget and miss out on vital products your team needs to succeed. 

Or

If you can’t justify the spending decisions vital products will be cut from your budget, making 2020 a stressful year.    

Only a few more days until you have to present your proposed budget to upper management for approval. To properly prepare and get what your team needs, you need to brainstorm exactly what your team will require throughout the year in order to succeed and grow. So how do you get it right the first time? There are many different things you need to take into account when building out your budget forecast: 

2019

• Review your existing 2019 plan and what worked and didn’t

• What activities and software did you not utilize and where was time/money wasted

• Your fixed costs, variable expenses, salaries, and any other operating expenses 

2020

• What are the company's goals in 2020 (growing or shrinking)?

• Your department’s estimated impact to revenue and expense 

• What areas do you need to improve in 2020?

• Software programs you need to continue paying for and anticipate purchasing 

When deciphering all these numbers it is critical to understand your department goals for the next year. Are you looking to increase ROI? Are you growing your events program? Do you want to scale as you onboard new programs or employees? Do you have your goals in mind and are these goals achievable with your current people and technology?  Most companies have an idea of where they want to go in the next year, but little idea on how to get there; thus resulting in an inaccurate budget. 

Our tip for you? If you want to scale, save time and prove ROI from your events program put a placeholder budget for EventOPS. EventOPS is an online SaaS software to help you with all of your event needs including internal/external event approval, resource allocation, run of show, site walk through, document management, budget to actual, ROI reporting and repeatable templates. We provide modules to streamline your event process from conception to reconciliation. If your OKRs in 2020 are aligned with the achievements EventOPS can help you reach, navigate to our demo page to learn more about our software.

Own your 2020 budget!