Research reveals that people perform well when they are having fun. According to a research published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, we tend to engage in unpleasant but necessary activities such as doing taxes, paying bills or housework when in a good mood.
Tweet this:Don’t be like a boring preacher who speaks in a monotone voice and reads the same verse again and again!
Another research published in the book “301 Ways to Have Fun at Work” confirms that, there is a direct link between productivity and the extent to which employees have fun. Having fun at work helps charity workers to:
- Work productively;
- Deliver the best results in all charity programs;
- Come up with solutions, and
- Help charity organizations raise more funds.
The budget plays an important role in making sure that the available funds complete all programs and where possible, that there’s something left to raise more funds for 2018. You’ll need the complete cooperation of your team in order to achieve the best results. You’ll only have this cooperation when you make budgeting to be enjoyable for them.
Let’s explore some useful tips on how not to be a “boring charity organization”.
1.Create a fun-filled environment
Don’t be like a boring preacher who speaks in a monotone voice and reads the same verse again and again! The decorum to which people approach the finance activities only makes addressing financial issues difficult. Create an environment where invoices are raised with a dazzling smile, and discrepancies quickly corrected without raising the roof.
- Allocate some playtime for charity staff members. For example, a day when the finance department will compete with the marketing department in the outdoors game.
- Have a laugh, swap jokes and poke more fun. It’s been scientifically proven numerous times that laughter is the best medicine to people.
- Introduce some good music sessions.
A toxic environment is always a breeding ground for clandestine activities, fraud, back stabbing, theft and stress. You don’t want any of that, do you?
2.Replace formalities with a user-friendly system
Formalities cannot prevent fraud and embezzlement of funds, but only complicate the financial management process. They are the killer of fun. They are not helping in anyway to make budgeting easier.
The Global Fraud Study by the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners discovered that, on average 5 percent of all nonprofit revenues are lost to fraud, with 22 percent involving the loss of more than $1 million.
The following time-consuming formalities should be avoided:
- Creating several paper-based processing forms that need to be filled every time funds are about to be spent.
- Creating those boring month end checklists that every accountant should follow. Do you really think accountants are not smart enough to memorize a checklist?
- Phoning the finance department to confirm if you are still working within budget. Believe me, receiving a phone call after another phone call asking you the same question is a real fun killer.
Make budgeting fun by introducing a user-friendly system such as Procurementexpress.com. It allows nonprofit leaders to keep an eye on their budget without harassing the finance department with limitless calls.
3.Budgeting is a game!
We know that nonprofit organizations are not budgeting right when it doesn’t feel like a game to their staff members. Your staff members should look forward to spending within budget because budgeting doesn’t feel like a difficult task to them.
Only a software like Procurementexpress.com can allow nonprofit leaders to have insight into the organizational spending without killing the fun. For example, with Procurementexpress.com a budget is setup with a single approver or even multiple approvers in the case of PO routing. A budget is adjusted by a nonprofit COO or CFO at any time and the amounts are adjustable.
Not only that, Procurementexpress.com can also:
- make use of four different role associations to help distinguish between different access levels and users who can raise POs.
- a team member has the ability to raise PO’s and only has access to those PO’s raised by him/her.
- There’s also an approver role which is only reserved for those responsible for budgets.
What are you waiting for? Sign up for a free trial.
If you’d like more info about Procurementexpress.com (an automated purchase control system), please contact: [email protected]
