Since 1997, funding for the background police has increased by 77% (or 39% in real terms) and £4.8 billion.However, these funding levels are no longer available to forces.The annual cycle of looking for efficiencies year after year is not sustainable, as Chief Constables and senior management acknowledge, and it will not address the cash shortage in subsequent years.The Police Service must adopt novel strategies to generate the productivity and efficiency gains required to provide high-quality policing to the public in the face of slower funding growth and real cash deficits in their budgets.The step-change in execution expected to address this difficulty might be accomplished assuming that the police administration completely embraces successful asset the board and makes proficient and useful utilization of its innovation, associations and individuals.In order to address these difficulties and effectively support Forces’ goals, the finance function plays a crucial role.With individual procurement activities that do not take advantage of economies of scale, challenge police forces typically cultivate a divisional and departmental culture rather than a corporate one.Over the course of more than a decade, functions have been shifting from the center to the divisions.Police forces must establish a corporate back office and elicit behavioral change in order to mitigate the threat of mandatory, centrally-driven “top down” initiatives and reduce costs.Instead of the organization being divided into a series of silos, this change needs to be based on adhering to a corporate culture.Building a Best-in-Class Finance Function In the past, police force finance departments have primarily supported transactional processing, with little support for management information and business decision-making.With a renewed emphasis on efficiencies, finance departments must urgently transform in order to maximize the force’s value at the lowest possible cost.1) Aligning with Force Strategy Because police departments need money to run, it’s important that finance and operations work together well.Although there are numerous obstacles to overcome in order to achieve this model, this collaboration has the potential to be very potent and contribute to the delivery of significant enhancements to a Force.In addition to determining whether their Force is prepared for this collaboration, Finance Directors must also consider whether the Force can function without it.A clear vision that centers on finance’s role as a balanced business partner is necessary.However, in order to realize this vision, a significant bottom-up effort is required to comprehend the significant complexity of the underlying systems and processes and to devise a strategy that is applicable to that organization.Execution is critical to the success of any change management program.Correct implementation of change is difficult and costly, and frequently, police forces lack the necessary experience to effect such change.Even though finance directors are now required to have relevant professional credentials rather than being former police officers, as was the case a few years ago, many have advanced within the public sector with few opportunities to interact with cutting-edge methods and learn from them.Additionally, self-preservation-related cultural issues can impede change.Although promoting financial transformation is relatively simple, securing commitment to make bold changes can be challenging.Even when they are of exceptional quality, business cases frequently lack the commercial awareness necessary to earn the trust of senior police officers.2) Decisions that Support the Force A lot of finance directors want to grow their finance departments.By dedicating more time and effort to financial analysis and providing senior management with the tools necessary to comprehend the financial implications of major strategic decisions, they must convince the rest of the Force that the finance function can add value.Sarbanes-Oxley, Basel II, Individual Capital Assessments (ICA), and International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) have all brought financial reporting and controls into the spotlight in the private sector.As a result, public sector financial controls are receiving more attention.A “Best in Class” police force finance function will not only have the minimum controls necessary to comply with regulatory requirements, but it will also evaluate how the laws and regulations it is required to follow can be used to add value to the organization.Giving vital data that will empower the power to meet its targets is a critical undertaking for a main money capability.3) Benefit to the Force Over the past decade or so, the drive for development has resulted in divisional decision-making and an increase in finance department costs.Through using various drives in a program of change, a Power can use up to 40% of reserve funds on the expense of money along with working on the responsiveness of money groups and the nature of monetary data.Among these initiatives are:Centralization A police force can establish centers of excellence where industry best practices can be developed and shared by centralizing the finance function.This will not just re-engage the division, making more noteworthy freedom and objectivity in evaluating ventures and execution, yet additionally lead to more predictable administration data and a more significant level of control.A Police Power can likewise foster a colleague gathering to go about as essential contacts to offices and divisions.Instead of simply advising that the budget had been missed for the previous month, the business partners might, for instance, suggest ways in which the commanders of the department and division can meet the budget in subsequent months.Finance professionals will find that they now have more time to work as business partners with departments and divisions and focus on strategic issues because the mundane work of crunching numbers is being done in a shared service center.It is important to not underestimate the cultural impact on department and divisional commanders.Officers will be worried that:o Their budgets will be centralized; o Their workloads will rise; o They won’t have on-site support; but if the centralized shared service center is designed correctly, none of the aforementioned issues should arise.In point of fact, the following advantages should accrue to leaders as a result of centralization under a best practice model:o Strategic advice from business partners o More flexibility o Better management information o Faster transactions o Fewer unanswered questions o More clarity on service and cost of provision o Forum for finance to be strategically aligned to the needs of the Force A force that moves from a decentralized to centralized system should make an effort to keep in touch with the Chief Constable and Divisional Commanders.A governance structure that meets operational, tactical, and strategic requirements as well as a solid business case for finance transformation are required for the forces.If the program is not carefully managed, there is a possibility that the potential benefits of implementing such a change will not be realized.A successful centralized finance function requires investment.In most cases, the potential benefits of greater visibility and control in the future, consistent processes, standard management information, economies of scale, long-term cost savings, and a empowered group of proud finance professionals ought to outweigh the initial costs.The finance functions can be outsourced entirely or in part to third parties to lessen the commercial, operational, and capability risks.Benefits in terms of cost are guaranteed, and you might be able to take advantage of relationships with vendors who supply best-practice procedures as a result.Process Efficiencies The focus on development that is typically placed on police forces has typically resulted in the formation of a culture that is based on silos and has various processes.As a result, there are numerous opportunities for process standardization and simplification that offer scalability, reduce manual labor, and benefit the business.A force can typically achieve a 40 percent reduction in the number of processes by simply rationalizing them.Using electronic bank statements instead of paper ones for bank reconciliation and accounts receivable is an illustration of this.The time and effort required to analyze the data, transfer it to a different spreadsheet, and enter it into the financial systems would be significantly reduced as a result of this.Associations that have a storehouse working model will more often than not have huge failures and duplication in their cycles, for instance in HR and Finance.This is largely because the teams involved achieved their own objectives without aligning with an organization’s overall goals.There are a number of independent teams within a police force that are dependent on one another for data. Finance departments, divisions, and headquarters all send and receive information from the rest of the force as well.The silo model causes teams to receive ineffective data, necessitating additional work to obtain the necessary information.Although the case for development has been well made in the context of bringing decision-making closer to the delivery of operational services, the added costs of resources, duplicate work, and misaligned processes have rarely been discussed in the debate.These expenses must be taken into account in light of the current economic climate.A leading finance department will regularly establish goals for employees to achieve within transactional processes.The metric-based culture that is developed by leading finance functions includes this goal setting.It has been demonstrated that productivity and quality will improve if the appropriate metrics of productivity and quality are used, and if these targets are difficult but not impossible.The primary goals of a “Best in Class” finance function in police forces will be to provide a high level of customer (departments, divisions, employees, and suppliers) satisfaction.Using a metric-based approach, a “Best in Class” finance function will measure customer satisfaction promptly.This will be accompanied by a team-wide focus on process improvement, with process owners—who need not necessarily be team leads—taking responsibility for force-wide enhancements to each finance process.Hierarchical Upgrades
Hierarchical designs inside Police Powers are ordinarily comprised of managers driving groups of one to four colleagues.An opportunity exists to increase the span of control to best practice levels of six to eight team members to one team lead / supervisor by concentrating and consolidating the finance function.Police forces can reap significant cash benefits from a decrease in the number of team leads by altering the organizational structure and increasing the span of control, and team leads can gain better management experience from managing larger teams.Improvements Made Possible by Technology There are a lot of technological advancements that a police force could make to help build a finance department that is “Best in Class.”These are some:A) Filtering and work process
Through embracing a filtering and work process answer for supplant manual cycles, further developed perceivability, straightforwardness and efficiencies can be harvested.B) A call logging, tracking, and workflow tool Police forces typically have a number of people who respond to questions from suppliers and internal customers.These queries are not recorded or tracked in any way.There are two effects of this:o A particular finance team devotes a significant amount of time and effort to queries.Due to the absence of query logging, there is a significant chance of duplication of effort.For instance, person A in the finance team might respond to a query for thirty minutes.Because this query was not recorded, it could take up to 20 minutes to ensure that the background was adequately explained if the person who asked the question called up again and spoke to a different person just for one more question.o Queries may have multiple business interfaces.Up to four distinct teams can respond to an unanswered question, which can take a long time to provide the supplier with a clear response.With the creation of a central queries team and the implementation of a call logging, tracking, and workflow tool to document, measure, and resolve internal and supplier queries, the effort required to respond to queries within the finance departments and divisions, as well as within the actual departments and divisions, and procurement would be significantly reduced.C) Database solution Before data is entered into the financial system, a lot of spreadsheets are used in finance departments.In order to meet the requirements of various teams, information is frequently transferred manually from one spreadsheet to another.Supplanting the bookkeeping sheets with a data set arrangement would support the quantity of information sources and lead to exertion reserve funds for the cutting edge Cops as well as Police Staff.D) Alter reports
In getting the board data from the monetary frameworks, police staff run a progression of reports, import these into succeed, use queries to match the information and execute turns to outline the information as required.This work necessitates a significant amount of manual labor.Through redoing reports the results from the monetary framework can be set up to give the information in the organizations expected through the snap of a button.The team members who had previously carried out these routine tasks would be motivated to work less hard and with less effort as a result of this.A Police Force will face a number of obstacles when designing, purchasing, and putting new technology-enabled tools into use, including getting investment approval;IT expertise;capability;and purchasing.Partnering with a third-party service provider, who can share the investment, provide the skills, and shorten the procurement cycle, can mitigate these obstacles.Conclusion It is abundantly clear that technological, procedural, and cultural shifts are necessary for police departments to provide high-quality services and long-term efficiency gains.New ways of thinking are needed in the current finance delivery models because, for the first time, forces are facing real cash deficits and must reduce the number of police officers and support staff while maintaining current performance levels.Although achieving a best-in-class finance function will require overcoming a number of obstacles, such a decision will soon become mandatory.The people who are on the ball will unavoidably wind up in a more grounded position.Rakesh Sangani is a Partner at Proservartner. He focuses on back office transformation in the fields of professional services, health care, local government, and police.http://EzineArticles.com/1210274
