Full Synchronization of Business Planning and Budgeting (1998)

Abstract

Reform in UNOPS was difficult to follow through, because there were so many issues to consider. UNOPS started out by formulating a strategy in the Leaky Boat, and continued by developing its business planning. Little by little, every year, UNOPS attempted to improve its business planning. The annual business plans provide an overview of the progress UNOPS made with this, as well as substantive issues, such as its risk assessment. These plans also showed that other issues, such as human resource management, required sustained attention over longer periods of time. By the same token, the range of issues became more diverse; risk management, human resource management, decentralization, and establishing normative control were all necessary, but different, aspects of the reform process. As a consequence, the reform process started to look increasingly like a patchwork of issues that were less closely related and progressed more slowly than the activities in the first stages of the reform.