Management for Community and Social Services - Statistics Project Example

Management for Community and Social Services Management for Community and Social Services Part Short Definitions Competitive advantage is the advantage that a firm enjoys over its competitors that usually allows it to generate large margins in sales. This usually emerges since such firms with competitive advantages over other often retain large number of customers than their competitors. Comparative advantage is the potential gains on trade for an individual, nation, or firm based on different trade factors owned by one individual, government, or firm over the other. For instance, the developed economies have high competitive advantage over the developing nations and the third world due to their advanced technology (McKinney, 2004). Responsibility center is defined as a company’s subunit that assigns the managers responsibility and authority. A detailed organizational chart usually acts as the logical source that determines the responsibility centers within any company (Gross, McCarthy, and Shelmon, 2010). It should be noted that the responsibility centers usually outline the functional entities within which any companies’ businesses are undertaken and they define companies’ goals and objectives, financial reports, and policies and procedures, as well as defining how the staff is dedicated. For example, if the top management of any organization wants to determine the level of the commitment of their staff members, they can use the organizational chart which is the responsibility center of the organization. SWOT Analysis is matrix that provides a defined and structured method through which a business or an organization can evaluate its’ underlying “strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats” that are involved in running its operations (Assen, Van, Pietersma, and Have, 2008). It is worth noting that SWOT analysis can be conducted on people, products, and places within which a business venture is operated. For example, a business may decide to carry out SWOT analysis to determine its competitive edge within a competitive market or due to changes or emergence of competitors. Managed Care are plans within the health care systems that are mainly offered by the health insurance. The managed care plans normally have contract with medical facilities and heath care providers to provide health care services at a reduced cost to the members. The health care providers contracted by this plan forms the plan’s network defining how the care plan is to be paid (McKinney, 2004). In other words, the managed care plans payments are defined by the plan’s network rules. For instance, the managed care plan provides an individual with point of service (POS) plan that allow the user to choose from either PPO or HMO whenever they need such services. The Nature of 501c(3) organizations is usually defined by their functions that includes educational, religious, scientific, charitable, testing for public safety, Fostering for international or national Amateur Sport competition, as well as prevention to animal and children cruelty. Notably, all these organizations are exempted from taxation. Additionally, it is worth noting that these organizations have the tendency of working together (Conference on Tax Planning for 501(c) (3) Organizations & New York University, (1989). Mission Statement is a “statement of purpose” that defines the main reasons of existence of an organization, a company, or an individual. The formulation of a mission statement is guided by actions, priorities, and responsibilities that are to be undertaken by the organization, project, or an individual. The statement should be “clear, memorable, and concise.” For instance, the mission statement of the Wounded Warrior Project states that, “To honor and empower wounded warriors (Korlaar, 2014).” Part 2: Budgeting 2. Suppose that as a director of a human services agency that had always been supported by federal funds, you learned that your funding was going to be cut drastically because of an economic crisis. How would you propose to adjust your budget so that it balances? For example, would you concentrate your efforts on fighting the cutbacks, planning for more limited programming, or cultivating other revenue streams? Describe what steps you would need to take, depending on your chosen strategy (or strategies). The human services agency is a nonprofit making organization that mainly aims at addressing the plight of the entire population regarding the quality of services they are offered towards improving the quality of life (United States, 2011). Therefore, in the case were the federal government is compelled to cut its funding to the organization, it will be needless for the organization to concentrate its efforts in fighting the cutbacks, rather it would be prudent to inculcate other revenue streams to source funds and funding for the organization’s projects. On realizing that the federal government’s cutbacks, the organization will call for urgent strategic meeting with the relevant organs of the organization to ponder on other available avenues of generating funds to balance the budget facilitate by the cutbacks. The first and vital strategy that will be initiating is the writing of proposal to other organizations that are likely to fund some of our projects, running some of our project either fully or partially, or that will be likely willing to partner with our organization in driving our goals and objective as per specific project or projects (McKinney, 2004). Hence, the organization will revisit its projects with the aim of identifying what organization matches with what projects and to what degree of partnership in rolling out the projects. Additionally, the organization may opt to share some of its programs with other organizations that are willing and able to run their intended or underlying programs. It is vital to share or have open competition with organization with similar projects so that the organization shares or merges projects with other organization with similar projects. This step will also reduce chances of possible duplication of ideas or projects (Gross, McCarthy, and Shelmon, 2010). Reviewing of each project’s scope will also help in reducing the cost of certain project in that the reviews of the projects’ strategies will eliminate overspending that might have not been overlooked during the initial project formulation. In other words, projects will be rolled in order of priorities and urgency but with limited resources. Restricting projects through centralizations as well as systems modernizations will help in eliminating cross management and fragmentation of systems that in most cases lead to redundancy in management; thus, posing challenges to the beneficiaries. Therefore, identification and fixing of these inefficiencies will be a means of saving money since they will reduce economies of scale within the organization. Moreover, it will make the agency to operate in a more coordinated manner thereby making the citizens to operate only with expedite programs (United States, 2011). This strategy will make citizens to access numerous services but using fewer organization’s resources. For instance, using call centers, internet application portals, as well as social services as opposed to reaching out to the citizens by the organization’s staff members. All these strategies will help in balancing budget following the federal cutbacks. 3. The use of various budgeting methods are important for different reasons within human service agencies. Briefly define, then compare and contrast line item budgeting, performance budgeting, and incremental budgeting and their uses within an organization. Make sure you discuss the strengths, weaknesses, and application of each budget type. Line item budgeting is an individual or single financial statement where items are grouped according to department or cost centers. This form of budgeting easily shows the comparison between different organizational financial periods including past accounting financial data or the budgeting period and the estimated current or future figures (McKinney, 2004). The line time budgeting allows organizational expenditures or items to be recorded or slotted depending on their historical needs. This system of budgeting often have some advantages as well as disadvantages to the organization. The main advantage of this budgeting system is that it usually simple to formulate. In other words, it makes it easy to budget for each department based on their historical expenditure requirements (Lewis, Packard, and Lewis, 2012). Its historical nature makes it a reliable means of anticipating future expenses of the department or the organization. Its simplicity makes it save time and effort in its preparation since it makes all the necessary data available for manipulation. Additionally, this form of budgeting easily allows justification of the expenditures; thus, making it easy for the relevant organs to maintain tight budgetary control; hence, reducing chances or possibilities of frivolous spending. The line item budgeting major disadvantages including its possibilities of only providing superficial analysis of the intended expenditures. In this case, the provided budget may only be a reflection of status quo in that the line item budget may be approved following the previous performance of similar budget. This may lead to failures due to insufficient funding or over funding due to changes in economies of scale (McKinney, 2004). The line item budgeting sometimes leads departments into unnecessary spending since in some cases it leads to unused funds at the end of the budgeting period. This often leads to the application of the “use it or lose it” phenomenon that compels the departmental heads to misuse money fearing the slash of their budget in the coming budgetary period if they return too much money at the end of the budget period. Notably, the misused money due to fear of slash may have been channeled to other vital areas or projects of the organization. Performance budgeting is a budgeting system that compares the input of the resources and output of the services within each unit or department of the organization. The performance budgeting is different from the line item budget since the latter only shows the reflection of the historical figures of the budget without concentrating on the outcome of the services as per budgeting, but it is similar to the incremental budgeting where funds are allocated to improve the services within the department or organization. The main advantage of performance budgeting is that it provide relational approach to the budgeting process since it is concerned on the performance of the services in relation to the implementation of budget (Lewis, Packard, and Lewis, 2012). It links the objectives to the intended outcome; hence, slotting expenditure with regards to the intended outcome. However, despite the measure of the input and the outcome of the performance budgeting, this system of budgeting has disadvantages including provision of fixed costs to items. Therefore, just like the line item budget, the performance budgeting do not provide extra funds for any eventualities that might rise due to changes in economies of scale. Nonetheless, this system of budgeting is best applied in evaluating legislative priorities of the organization. Unlike the line item and performance budgeting that is provided on annual or periodic fixed basis, the Incremental budgeting is formulated with slight changes in the budgets. These changes might have been facilitated by the actual results on the budget or just increment decided during the budgeting period. This form of budgeting is usually applied if the management do not intend to spend more time in redrafting the budget due to changes that may be reported in the implementation of the budget. Hence, the incremental budgeting is applied when the organization is running on tight and numerous programs (McKinney, 2004). Unlike performance budgeting, the incremental budgeting is as simple as line item budgeting in formulation and justification of the budget itself. Nonetheless, unlike the two, it provides funding and operational stabilities. The incremental budgeting has disadvantages including the small nature of increment. In cases that a project may need major changes in funding, this form of budgeting will call for enormous time to reformulate. Like the line item budgeting, the incremental budgeting can also foster the “lose it or use it.” This phenomenon may lead to wastage of money by the budget implementers. Most of all, the incremental budgeting may be a mean of destroying the organization and must never be employed for many projects (Lewis, Packard, and Lewis, 2012). In other words, of all these budgeting methods, the incremental budgeting should be avoided at all costs and only be implemented if there is no alternative for a budgeting means. Part 3: Management Models 2. The strategic planning process is essential to successful organizations. What are the components of the strategic planning process? How has an agency from your field or work experience demonstrated the strategic planning process (be specific)? How might they benefit from the process? Strategic plan is a process of initiating a way of how to drive the organization into the future or how to attain vision, solve problems, or implement projects and programs of an organization. The plan usually employ different approaches but the key components of the strategic planning process include: i. Mission statement – this is a “statement of purpose” that defines the main reasons of existence of an organization, a company, or an individual. The formulation of a mission statement is guided by actions, priorities, and responsibilities that are to be undertaken by the organization, project, or an individual. The statement should be “clear, memorable, and concise (Korlaar, 2014). ii. Vision statement – this is a statement that reflect where the organization intends to be in the near future (mainly within a period of 5 years). iii. Value statement – are passionate and enduring statements that have distinctive organizational core values. They act as guiding organizational principles and they are regarded as never changing since they are the foundation of the organizational strategic plan. iv. SWOT – is the organization view of its current position in relation to its competitors in terms of its “strength, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats” (Assen, Van, Pietersma, and Have, 2008). v. Competitive advantage - is the advantage that a firm enjoys over its competitors that usually allows it to generate large margins in sales. This usually emerges since such firms with competitive advantages over other often retain large number of customers than their competitors. vi. Long term strategic objectives – these are objectives to be met in not less than three years of their formulation. The help in focusing in achieving the organizational vision. vii. Strategies – are well laid approaches geared towards attaining “organizational goals, objectives, and vision” (Assen, Van, Pietersma, and Have, 2008). viii. Short term goals – these are regarded as items that are to be used in converting strategic objectives into specific tasks to be executed by the specific individuals within the organization. These goals spell when, what, and who to carry out specific task. It is worth noting that the execution of these tasks are measurable. ix. Scorecard – they are parameters used to report key performance indicators (KPIs). They are also used to report the performance with time. x. Financial assessment – this is done based on past records to help in future projections. It helps in planning and predicting the future; thereby, allowing perfect control of the organizational financial performance. How has an agency from your field or work experience demonstrated the strategic planning process (be specific)? The agency that I work for has severally demonstrated or rather applied the strategic planning processes in completing and/or evaluating its projects. In so doing, the organization often apply the strategic planning processes in different models depending on what projects or programs its rolling out and the level at which they are implemented. For instance, for short lived programs and/or projects, the organization usually apply the model one that involves the application of basic components of strategic planning components. In the basic approach, the organization often conduct the following strategic planning procedures: i. Formulates a mission statement for the intended project. This statement explain the basic purpose of the organization or the programs to be rolled. It addresses specific audience or community that the organization intends to serve with its intended programs. The organizational mission statement is usually developed by the top level management. ii. After the formulation of the mission statement, intermediary goals are formulated. These are usually general, but they outline the needs of accomplishing the intended organizational tasks. iii. The next step is usually the identification of how the outlined goals are to be met. These steps are usually the action plans that outline the major functions that department or the agency must take to ensure that intended strategies are implemented effectively. In this case, the top management usually identify or create committees that work on specific set objectives. iv. After rolling the implementation of the strategic plans, monitoring and evaluation are done to ensure that the rolled programs or projects are progressing as was intended; otherwise, the set strategic plan or actions plan are updated or amended accordingly to ensure the goals and objected of the programs/projects under implementation are met effectively. It should be noted that different programs or projects usually require different approach and incorporation of different strategic planning models; thus, the understanding and requirement are usually applied in our agency. How might they benefit from the process? The organization usually benefit from the strategic planning processes since the process usually calls for the input of all stakeholders; hence, none of the stakeholders will feel left out in the vital activities and decision making of the organization. It allows the intended organizational projects and programs to be addressed under collective agreement. Applying the process often helps in prioritizing programs and/or projects’ goals thereby making it easy to measure the effective or the usefulness of the project being implemented by the organization. Strategic Planning processes help in addressing conflicting goals and mandates in addressing issue of public concerns. 4. Briefly define and then compare and contrast strengths-based management and hierarchical management (top down). Strength based management is a system of management that regard every employee to be worth of being productive in all aspects of production and management while hierarchical management is where employees are ranked into levels with each level having a leader. From the definition, it is apparent that the hierarchical management may lead to several levels of management under numerous leaderships within the organization especially when the organization in question is large (Carmichael, 2011). On the other hand, the strength based managed organizations regards all employees to be equal to all tasks thereby few ranks are expected for this system of management. Additionally, in hierarchical management, the employees are subjected to chain of command while in strength based management, employees are built and considered capable to perform any and all tasks assigned to them. Despite the underlying differences, both in strengths-based management and hierarchical management, new employees are trained towards turning their talents into skills so that that they can perform effectively on the tasked they are assigned (Assen, Van, Pietersma, and Have, 2008). Therefore, in both systems, the employees are expected to learn to rise in rank (as per the hierarchical management) and to better and perfect their roles/skills (in the strengths-based management) after effective trainings. Finally, it is worth noting that in both systems of management, the employees have leaders; however, in hierarchical management many leaders are expected (depending on the size of the organization) compared to very few leaders in the case of strengths-based management (regardless of the size of the organization) (Carmichael, 2011). Part 4: Financial Analysis Development of the financial balance sheet is a vital step in improving financial management skills that in turns helps in understanding the current and future organizational financial positions. The balance often helps in determining the financial net worth of the organization; hence, helping adopting effective expense management techniques. Moreover, the same understanding will help in determining financial weaknesses of the organization. Above all the available techniques, the seven ratios are considered vital in understanding the current financial status of an organization and helping in undertaking the corrective measures in areas that problem may be looming. These ratios include: i. Liquidity ratio – this helps in determining the ability of an organization to meet its committed expenses during emergencies. a. Liquidity ratio = cash or cash equivalents/ monthly committed expenses or = liquid assets/ net worth = 7543752/ 101,000 = 74.69 The expected ratio herein is between 3 and 6, but the result indicates 74.69 this shows that this organization is not prepared to deal with its financial emergencies. This organization should increase its net worth to attain the required limits to cope with its future financial challenges. ii. Asset to debt ratio = total Assets/ total liabilities = 8,142,345/598,593 = 13.6 This ratio shows that the organization has much of what it owns compared to what it owes iii. Current ratio = cash or cash equivalents / short term liabilities = 2,964,194/ 598,593 = 4.95 This is a positive ratio and it predicts that this organization can service its short term liabilities but to greater extents. iv. Debt Service Ratio = Short Term Liabilities / Total Income = 598,593/ 2,964,194 = 0.2 Lower ratios shows that the management are in good position to manage debts. v. Saving Ratio = Monthly Surplus / Monthly Income = 1357057.5/126410.75 = 10.74 The ratio is above 10 thereby indicating that if the organization works within its current operation limits, it is in a good position to achieve its future financial goals. vi. Solvency Ratio = Net Worth / Total Assets = 15686097/ 8142345 = 1.93 This ratio is positive thereby indicating that the assets are more worth compared to liabilities. Despite being positive, the figure is too low that the organization needs to increase its net worth in order to stand in a better position in repaying its debts using its available assets. vii. Investment Assets To Total Assets = Liquid Assets / Total Assets = 7543752/8142345 = 0.93 This figure should hold at least 20% but for the organization it’s about 9.3%. This shows that this organization has less assets that it can convert into cash easily; hence, it should work on increasing its assets especially the fixed assets to meet this financial safety. Part 5: Extra Credit Confidence – is an assessment trait that measures personality. For instance, confidence is my personal attribute and it often helps me in negotiation for personal benefits and on behave of my organization. It also help me to be composed thereby contributing/explaining my ideas in well understandable manner that sponsors are left highly convinced to our line of actions thereby sponsoring our projects and/or programs. References Assen, M. ., Van, B. G., Pietersma, P., & Have, S. (2008). Key management models: What they are and when to use them. Harlow: Financial Times Prentice Hall. Carmichael, J. (2011). Leadership and management development. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Conference on Tax Planning for 501(c)(3) Organizations., & New York University. (1989). Conference on Tax Planning for 501(c)(3) Organizations: [proceedings]. New York: M. Bender. Gross, M. J., McCarthy, J. H., & Shelmon, N. E. (2010). Financial and accounting guide for not-for-profit organizations. Hoboken, N.J: Wiley. Korlaar, C. V. (2014). Nonprofits: EXAMPLE MISSION STATEMENTS. Retrieved October 28, 2014, from http://topnonprofits.com/examples/nonprofit-mission-statements/ Lewis, J. A., Packard, T. R., & Lewis, M. D. (2012). Management of human service programs. Belmont, CA: Thomson Brooks/Cole. McKinney, J. B. (2004). Effective financial management in public and nonprofit agencies. Westport, CT: Praeger. United States. (2011). Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and related agencies appropriations for 2012: Hearings before a subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations, House of Representatives, One Hundred Twelfth Congress, and first session. Washington: U.S. G.P.O. Read More