Beyond Budgeting: any chance for managementimprovement?

This study makes a comparative analysis of the discussion pointsbrought up by Hope and Fraser in questioning what they call the “traditional”company budget format, with a view to identifying aspects that offer more adequateand effective company management opportunities to organizations. In this sense, theconfrontation between both authors and the traditional ones leads to the conclusionthat, once again, this discussion deals with a new cycle that tries to recover classicqualitative budget aspects that, once complied with, do not need a new label for thesake of effective company management. Although the approach recommends thepossibility of not having an annual budget, strictly speaking, it proposes to emphasizea more strategic discussion, front line participation, greater confidence in managers,periodic result forecasting and elimination of the “fixed contract”, among otherelements. The critical analysis was divided into two groups so as to distinguishbetween criticism in relation to budget limitations and that resulting from itsinadequate usage. Finally, the authors do not solve some problems that may becaused by the nonexistence of a budget, besides creating other problems that wouldnot exist without the proposal.