Welcome to September! Summer’s over and it’s time to send kids back to school (whether remote or in-person this year), double down on Q4 efforts and begin planning for 2021! While the upcoming year will be unlike any other in terms of our work environments, some things will never change. For one, we’ll need to budget–and now’s the time to work on those plans in order to hit the ground running come January.
Budgeting season often balloons into much more than just talking numbers on a spreadsheet. It reflects back to strategy, operational planning, and often ROI that you and your company are looking to measure.
So, we sought out an expert to help us think through the highs and lows of budget planning specifically for software solutions. Dipesh Shah is a former CIO (InvenTrust Properties Corp) and current consultant with his firm, New Roads Consulting. He detailed the biggest setbacks he sees with real estate firms looking to budget for and successfully implement new software solutions.
He broke down his recommendations into three main areas:
First, begin with your strategy. Budget decisions should stem from a broader business plan that the whole team can get behind.
Second, determine your plan for measuring success from the outset. Successful spending and implementation decisions have clearly identified outcomes.
Finally, accountability is key. Without a system for holding your team accountable, firms risk investing in tools that don’t ultimately get adopted by the team at scale.
Download the ‘Budgeting Season: How to Build Tech Into Your 2021 Plan’ to guide you through setting up for 2021!
