Canadian Government Executive - Volume 24 - Issue 06

8 / Canadian Government Executive // December 2018/January 2019 EXECUTIVE BRIEF explicitly define the outcomes that servic- es (outputs) aim to deliver, and 2) provide to key political decision makers during the budget preparation process key perfor- mance indicators to measure the effective- ness and efficiency of its services. The IMF considers the basic model appropriate for all countries. A more advanced version is program- based budgeting: that is, departments present and justify their budgets with sup- porting performance information to the legislature and the public as part of the budget documentation. Program-based budgeting typically requires some form of legal appropriation (e.g., Parliament). Giv- en the requirements to have robust perfor- mance information, the IMF advises cau- tion in implementing the advanced model. Performance-based budgeting should not be seen as an isolated initiative. It should be viewed, rather, as part of a set of broader reforms – often referred to as Man- aging for Results – designed to focus on results delivered rather than internal pro- cesses. These broader reforms can include initiatives to increase the motivation and incentives of public employees, organiza- tional restructuring to increase the focus on service delivery and improve coordina- tion, and oversight changes to strengthen public accountability for performance. The fundamental difference between the basic and advanced models is that in the former, performance information is used to inform budget decisions, whereas in the advanced model, the information is used to determine budgets. The working definition used by the Treasury Board Sec- retariat (TBS) is in keeping with the IMF. Is Canada Ready? By ALISON TAYLOR Budgeting Performance-Based R ecently, there has been con- siderable interest in what is being referred to as ‘perfor- mance-based budgeting’. As I wasn’t clear on what that meant, it occurred to me that perhaps oth- ers weren’t as well. So I began to research it. Generally, one can argue that performance- based budgeting seeks to link the funding provided to government agencies to the re- sults they deliver to inform the budgeting process and increase the efficiency and ef- fectiveness of public expenditures. But there is more than one model or method. According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the “basic” model of performance-based budgeting consists of integrating spending priorities and pro- gram performance into the expenditure management cycle. The key criteria are: 1)