Proposal Budget - Principles of Design - Essay Example

Running Head: PROPOSAL BUDGET Title: Proposal Budget Name: Course: Instructor: Date: Introduction Proposal budget is a written report of the project in form of its expenditure. It comprises a list of all intended expenditures and revenues, enabling the researcher to attain available resources to implement the proposed project. In a proposal, a budget is used to attain two main purposes; to approximate as realistically as possible, the expenditure of attaining the objectives identified in the proposal, secondly, it is used to give a mean of assessing the project’s financial activities over the life of the project (Michael, & Salter, 2003). Thus, budget becomes significant component of a proposal as it gives the financial picture of the project ahead. Well drafted budget adds value to the understanding of ones project. In proposal budget, this comes in four main elements; itemized budget, non-itemised budget, fixed budget and flexible budget. Fixed budget is a financial plan designed not to change regardless of the changes in an organisation where as flexible budget is a financial plan designed to change in respect to the actual needs of the organisation at any given time. Therefore, we can say that flexible budget differs with the other budget elements as it does not depend on one activity level but a number of activities. At the same time, its final result is not compared to the last budget at the organisation (Scarlet, 2006). In regard to budget preparation, financial planners and accountants uses variety of tools to attain their objectives. On the same note, a planner may use either of the above four named elements of budget to attain the best budget for the project. This paper will discuss fixed budget together with the four principles of design. These will be in relation to proposal paper and presentation. Fixed Budget Fixed budget, as defined previously, it is the budget designed not to change regardless of the changes in an organisation. The budget does not take into account the possible variation in the organisational activities or market. This feature gives the budget a pretty stringent characteristic allowing no room for flexibility or errors. This budget is mostly used by organisations with minimal variable costs as they anticipate little or no variation at their organisation (Matthews, 2007). In relation to fixed budget, the organisation comes up with specific amount of money to be used in a given project within the organisation. The amount set aside for the project is not expected to change greatly regardless of the time of project implementation. Ambler looks at budgets in three dimensions; the scope of project, the resources available and schedule for the project (Ambler, 2004). With these three, she argues out that even in fixed budget, one of the aspects have to alter slightly, thus giving no budget a static characteristic. With same financials support offered to different projects in an organisation, the quality of the work might be at risk. This is to the fact that, the implementers of the project will have to face budgetary constraints thus reducing the quality or productivity of the project to be carried out (Ambler 2003). Principles of Design Fixed budget can be presented differently in proposal depending on the way in which the planner applies the four principles of design. Here, the paper will discuss the four principles giving their differences and finally coming up with way in which fixed budget can be presented in a proposal. The four principles go under the acronym CRAP meaning Contrast, Repetition, Alignment and Proximity (Williams, 2008). To start off, contrast is a visual attraction to any document. This principle is attained through varying textures, thickness of lines, colour, space and elements such as boxes and graphics. In budget presentation, most planners have used different colours to attract the viewers concentration to the information offered in the document. In fixed budget, contract can be illustrated through bolding the figures, changing the colour of some figures and underlining. This can presented as shown in the figure below: Material 32,500.00 Labour 15,000.00 Overhead 17,000.00 TOTAL EXPENSES $64,000.00 From the example, it is evident that any person going through the budget will focus on the total expense for the budget as it is highlighted on bold, red colour and underlined. Repetition is the repeat of some aspect of the design element in ones work (Williams, 2008). While as contrast attracts the reader attention to the document, repetition gives the reader the key element in the document. This assists in maintaining the reader’s attention on the document for a longer period. This can be attained through frequent use of same colour in some part of the document. For example, following the above example; EXPENSES Material 32,500.00 Labour 15,000.00 Overhead 17,000.00 TOTAL EXPENSES $64,000.00 INCOME Sales 32,500.00 Owner’s Equity 15,000.00 Beneficiaries 17,000.00 TOTAL EXPENSES $64,000.00 In the above example, the total expense has been repeated in bold, capital letters with red colour where as repeating the topic in bold italic and capital letters. This assists the reader to understand every category in the budget and important factor to consider when reading the budget. Alignment is how item are arranged on the page. This creates unity with the information on the document allowing the document to look clean. According to the above examples, the work is aligned to the left (Williams, 2008). This gives the reader easy time to get whatever they need from the document. Proximity is the way in which different elements on the budget are grouped together. For instance in the above examples, the costs of the items have been grouped vertically to organise the information reducing clutter and giving the reader a clear structure (Williams, 2008). In time of designing fixed budget, the four principles have to be used together as each of them plays different roles in the budget. These will provide the researcher or organisation with easier time to identify the elements in the budget that do not need to be altered in case of another project in future. In summary, budget is a vital component in any proposal and any researcher has to be keen when coming up with budget plan for the project. In case of fixed budget, one has to ensure that, the items with fixed cost are one which will not affect the quality of the project in any manner. References: Ambler, S. (2004): The Object Primer 3rd Ed Cambridge University Press Matthews, D. (2007) Special Event Production Indiana University Butterworth-Heinemann Michael, A. & Salter, B. (2003) Marketing through Search Optimisation Butterworth-Heinemann Scarlet, R. (2006) Cima Learning System 2007 Performance Evaluation Butterworth-Heinemann Williams, R. (2008) The Non-Designer’s Design Book 3rd Ed Peachpit Press Read More