The Principals’ Corner:

To pick up on the thread of the last two entries, I was now, as the principal of a large high school, prepared to launch a three-year budget process and thought all we had to do was distribute the various departments over the three years of the cycle to make it fit. We were home free   …….  Not!

When the department heads came forward with their first figure – what they needed as a “Maintenance Budget”, the total exceeded the two-thirds needed to reserve the one-third for the departments on their “Major Purchase Year Budget.”  In fact, the total of the “Maintenance Budgets” was just about identical to the whole budget.

I was disappointed with the results – and, quite frankly, the lack of candor – so I announced, somewhat strategically, that the initiative could not be realized since there was, according to their figures, not enough to generate the annual surplus needed for the “Major Purchase Year Budgets.”  I simply said, “I guess we’ll put this proposal aside.”

To my dismay, there was an outcry in favour of the proposal.  They all said they wanted to do it – so I started to hope again that I really was on my way.  I told them in the most plain and emphatic terms possible that if they wanted to make this proposal a reality, they would have to come back with realistic and honest figures on what was needed by each of them for a “Maintenance Year Budget.”

When they did – the figures for each department were “miraculously” reduced and we had what we needed – a bank of money each year for the departments to share on a three-year cycle.  For the next six years, the budget deliberations were handled quickly and efficiently with no rancor among the heads and no staff-room talk about how much money the “principal was holding back.”  In the end, I felt it was one of my most successful initiatives.

There are more details to be shared about how we handled the ebb and flow of the whole school budget when enrollment generated less or more monies than planned and what happened when all the new texts came out for a subject when the department was NOT in its “Major Purchase Year.”  I was pleased to find that many of the intricacies were worked out by the heads themselves as their confidence grew in terms of managing funds.

As a principal I learned two lessons.  The first is that multi-year budgeting really works to the advantage of all.  I also learned, or rather, had it reinforced to me in graphic terms, that unless there is trust and confidence in all the players, and in the process, there is little that can be accomplished.

Dr. Dan

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