Harvard University — John F. Kennedy School of Government
University Budget System

Challenges

Harvard University Kennedy School of Government (KSG) was looking for a centralized, position control budget system to support a web-based submission and approval process that communicated with the University’s data warehouse. KSG evaluated several off-the-shelf budget systems, but were unable to find one that satisfied their needs. Then KSG learned about MIT’s custom budget system built by D. Lawton Associates and decided to create a custom budget system.

Key Features

• Budget individual accounts or entire departmental budget groups based on prior year values.


• Create multiple versions of budgets and different scenarios.


• Import of operating budgets and budget upload to data warehouse.


• Special budgeting for faculty members and aggregation of budget groups for combined reporting and analysis.


• Download budget data into Excel for customized analysis.

Results for KSG

• Less time to prepare and aggregate budgets.


• All budget updates are immediately reflected to the entire department.


• Easy to integrate budget data from the data warehouse.


• Fewer errors due to standardized calculations for all budget groups.


• User administration enables controlled access to budget groups and salaries.


• Customized reports show budget vs. actuals by date, or department.

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