While it can vary from one government to the next, it’s very common for the single highest expense in a public-sector body to be related to its people and their related expenses, including health and retirement benefits. But unlike other types of spending, responsibility for understanding and managing this category may be shared • often between the finance and human resource departments. As a result, some people may not comprehensively understand how personnel drives costs. This course will cover the fundamental aspects of personnel budgeting and focus on ancillary areas that impact a government’s bottom line, ranging from health benefits to prevailing wages to pensions. Several tools and approaches to personnel budgeting will be discussed and debated among course participants.

Who Will Benefit: CFO/Finance Director, Budget Manager, Budget Analyst, Department Director

• Those who successfully complete this seminar should be able to:
• Develop understanding of public sector personnel issues and how it compares to the private sector
• Become more familiar with personnel classifications, grades, and steps
• Understand how to use hire plans to connect the budget document to day-to-day operations
• Learn about budgeting methods including budgeting for vacancies, retirements, etc.; understanding types of benefits such as health insurance, pension, deferred compensation and their potential impact to operating budgets
• Understand the differing methods to extrapolate future personnel costs
• Understanding pros and cons of different compensation approaches
• Develop approaches to budget monitoring responsibilities, including position control
• Link staffing levels to goal achievement 
• Develop cost allocation strategies