ABSTRACT
This chapter explores in general terms various concepts relating to financial and business management. It examines issues concerned with managing the internal and external environments. The chapter demonstrates the need for compatibility between business and budgetary management. It enlarges upon budget management principles and gives an overview of the totality of the process. The main items on the manager’s agenda should be restricted to those matters that have a business significance. In other words, professional and other related considerations should be debated and agreed in other forums. Business planning is a process which leads managers through a series of steps so that they can clearly identify so-called ‘discrete areas’ of activity. Budgetary management seems therefore to mean different things to different people and consequently there may be variations in different systems, attitudes and applications. Many believe that budgetary management and budgetary control are one and the same thing. Control is only a part of the management process.
