Week 2 Vital Factors in Finance and Budgeting Paper Week 2: Vital Factors in Finance and Budgeting: Ethics and Technology Administrators in government org
Week 2 Vital Factors in Finance and Budgeting Paper Week 2: Vital Factors in Finance and Budgeting: Ethics and Technology
Administrators in government organizations strive to operate in an ethical manner, and the public they serve demands it, especially when it comes to honesty and integrity related to finance and budgeting in public organizations. The public expects the government to act ethically when spending its hard-earned tax dollars. However, with the media uncovering and focusing on improprieties in government organizations, it is easy to wonder if the government is meeting those expectations. Still, there are ethical guidelines and internal controls that help government financial officers keep strictly to the “straight and narrow.”
During this week, you explore the topic of ethics in government finance and budgeting. In addition, you learn about emerging technologies that have become essential to the financial functioning of most public organizations. Technology is evolving every day, and it is changing the way business is conducted in all sectors of the economy. Just as you may rely on technology for news, communication, education, and even banking, public organizations rely on technology to manage income and expenditures.
REQUIRED READINGS
Eskridge, R. D., French, P. E., & McThomas, M. (2012). The international city/county management association code of ethics. Public Integrity, 14(2), 127–150.
Retrieved from the Walden Library databases.
Rossmann, D., & Shanahan, E. A. (2012). Defining and achieving normative democratic values in participatory budgeting processes. Public Administration Review, 72(1), 56–66.
Retrieved from the Walden Library databases.
American Society for Public Administration. (2012). Proposed code of ethics. Retrieved from http://www.aspanet.org/ASPADocs/Ethics%20Committee%20proposal%20for%20Council%2012-08-10.pdf
Kavanagh, S., Ruggini, J., Na, M., Kinney, A., Kreklow, S., Greiner, J., & Stewart, A. (2006). Market research report: Budgeting technology solutions. Retrieved from http://www.gfoa.org/sites/default/files/BudgetTechnologyReport.pdf
New York State Office of the Attorney General. (2010). Attorney General Cuomo expands investigation into “pension padding.” Retrieved from http://www.ag.ny.gov/press-release/attorney-general-cuomo-expands-investigation-pension-padding
U.S. Office of Government Ethics. (2016). Standards of ethical conduct for employees of the executive branch (pp. 1–90). Retrieved from https://www.oge.gov/Web/oge.nsf/Resources/Standards+of+Ethical+Conduct+for+Employees+of+the+Executive+Branch
REQUIRED MEDIA
Laureate Education (Producer). (2008e). Vital factors in finance and budgeting: Ethics and technology [Video file]. Baltimore, MD: Author.
Many government organizations and the professionals who work within them operate under ethics and accountability codes. Operating under a shared understanding of ethics is in the bestinterest of any organization. Certainly, when this occurs, stakeholders are more likely to gain and maintain trust in the organization. Conversely, when ethics are absent or violated, trust is eroded.
In this Discussion, you describe an actual ethical issue in a public organization related to finance and budgeting, such as pension padding, and consider how the issue is being addressed. Review this week’s Learning Resources and consider some general ethical guidelines for those working in finance and budgeting in public organizations. Then, select a government organization with an ethical issue or violation related to finance and budgeting.
With these thoughts in mind:
BY DAY 4
Post a brief description of the government organization (cannot be a non profit or a for profit, needs to be a government agency: ie: police department) you selected. Describe the ethical issue or violation you identified as it relates to finance or budgeting. Using the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA) Code of Ethics or the ethical guidelines within your organization and/or nation, explain why it is/was an ethical issue or violation. Then, explain how the organization is addressing or has addressed it. If a violation has not occurred, how would you recommend preventing one? Vital Factors in Finance and Budgeting: Ethics in Technology
Vital Factors in Finance and Budgeting: Ethics in Technology
Program Transcript
NARRATOR: this video, program Jacqueline Byers describes ethical guidelines
for those who work on budgets. She also talks about how technology is changing
the budgeting process.
JACQUELINE BYERS: Most of the people in organizations who developed
budgets are finance directors, administrators, et cetera. They have national
affiliations, professional affiliations. And many of these organizations to which
they belong have codes of ethics.
The codes of ethics vary from organization to organization. But they usually
includes things that are very much in common. The first one is personal
responsibility. And that personal responsibility means it is your job to do the best
job you can in the best way you know how, in accordance with all the laws that
exist. And those are set out in nearly every code of ethics that apply to people
who are in these positions.
The next is professional integrity. Don’t get involved in things that don’t have
anything to do with your job. That mean stay out of the politics of the
organization. You are the finance person. It is your job to take the plans, take the
numbers, and make them work. Your professional integrity requires you to stay
out of the politics that are involved.
And the last one, and this is always there. Avoid anything that’s perceived as a
conflict of interests. And the honest to goodness thing about conflict of interest, it
doesn’t even have to be a conflict of interest that you’re involved in. But if it’s
perceived as a conflict of interest. An example is if you’re the finance director and
you hire a law firm that your brother-in-law works for, or you hire an auditing firm
to do the independent audit that is your fraternity brother, it might very well be
that you had nothing to do with the fact that your fraternity brother works for that.
It was done through a valid RFP. But the appearance is there that some
favoritism or some reason beyond qualification might have been used for the
determining factor in giving that contract. That’s what I mean by the appearance
of impropriety. Avoid that at all costs.
Conflict of interest, declare, disclose if the budgetary firm is one that has some
affiliation with your family or someplace you used to work. Say up front, this is the
situation. Let everybody know, and then let somebody else make the decision as
to whether that’s the right people to be used in this project. Frequently, they
might be the sole source and especially a smaller community. They might be the
only auditing firm in town. As long as you disclose that conflict of interest and
everybody is aware of it and you remove yourself from the negotiation process or
signing any contracts, it’s OK. But keep in mind that’s in every ethical code that
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Vital Factors in Finance and Budgeting: Ethics in Technology
you will find that governs how people in these positions work. So those are the
issues that are always in those codes.
Most people in these positions have some kind of accreditation. And there are
sanctions that are available for violations of these kinds of codes. So that’s a
definite way that ethics are involved. A second way is that internal controls are
generally mandated by many different organizational codes, et cetera. An
organization itself, a government, private sector, should adopt internal controls.
Internal controls are done for several reasons. One, you establish them all across
the organization to make sure that it is a coordinated activity. The second thing is
that you want to get a set of internal controls that regularly reviews the risks, and
regularly organizes a process where you look at everything that’s being done.
And what I mean by internal controls is a simple thing to explain.
You don’t want the same person accepting money and entering it in the logbook
being responsible for writing up the deposit slip and putting it in the bank. There’s
too much room for hanky panky there. And most people say, oh, our folks are
honest. They do what they’re supposed to do. But suddenly, father doesn’t have
any insurance and needs a cancer operation, and nobody ever checked on me
all these years. If I get some cash money or a couple of other kinds of checks
paid out to cash, et cetera, I don’t have to enter those. It creates an atmosphere
that’s ripe for corruption. So you have an internal controls program that monitors
regularly. Looks to see if things are going OK, reviews what’s going on, and that
constant monitoring is what’s required in an internal controls program.
At the same time that paper budgetary process is going on and all the
evaluations are going on, all the processes of getting the budget prepared are
going on, technology is running in the background, doing revenue forecasts,
doing revenue projections, looking at how efficiently things worked in the past
year. Also doing a week by week, month by month, quarter by quarter
assessment of how the revenue came in, to see what it’s going to do and how it’s
going to impact the year that’s coming.
The same thing is going on for the future. And it’s an excellent way to monitor
how a budget is going and being processed according to a budgetary plan during
the year. A good piece of financial software that doesn’t cost very much can do
on a daily basis an accounting line by line of every line item and what was spent
that day. I don’t know if everybody wants a daily process of that. It’s kind of
boring to have all that paper. But it’s available.
The second thing is they can do a week by week. They can do a month by month
and a quarter by quarter. A good manager looks at these things to see who’s
overspending, who’s not producing, who’s using more money than they should
have. If your allocation is such that you’re supposed to be at this particular
spending level by December, and you’ve reached it by October 1, of good budget
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Vital Factors in Finance and Budgeting: Ethics in Technology
manager can use technology to find out you are exceeding your spending limit,
and send out that little pink slip. And say, stop now, readjust, or I’m going to do
something to adjust your budget.
So technology runs beautifully right along with the budget. And the simple
software that’s available today makes it so much simpler than it’s ever been in
the past. It can be used as an internal control. It can be used to forecast. It can
be used as a monitoring device. Technology helps in every aspect of budgeting.
Vital Factors in Finance and Budgeting: Ethics in Technology
Additional Content Attribution
Music:
Creative Support Services
Los Angeles, CA
Dimension Sound Effects Library
Newnan, GA
Narrator Tracks Music Library
Stevens Point, WI
Signature Music, Inc
Chesterton, IN
Studio Cutz Music Library
Carrollton, TX
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