Professional Software Development or Budgeting Basics and Beyond

Professional Software Development: Shorter Schedules, Higher Quality Products, More Successful Projects, Enhanced Careers

Author: Steve McConnell

Can you deliver 90% of your software on time, within budget, and fully meet the user's real requirements? Would you like to? Best-selling author Steve McConnell provides a compelling argument for turning software success into an everyday habit by advancing the software profession itself—at the individual, organizational, and industry levels. Expanding on the contents of his previous book After the Gold Rush, the author dispels common myths of software development.

If you are a programmer, software developer, engineer, or work in software development, you should READ THIS BOOK.

Why do so many companies use outdated and ineffective software development practices? See page 103

What is "cargo cult" software development, and who uses it? See page 23

How large is the return on investment for better software practices? Can you prove it? See page 115

How do you create career paths for software professionals? See page 143

Which affects projects more--good personnel or good process? See page 135

How much difference is there between the worst software companies and the best? See page xv

Book review: Getting Interviews or Project Management for Information Systems

Budgeting Basics and Beyond

Author: Jae K Shim

Budgeting Basics and Beyond, Second Edition provides managers with a hassle-free resource that’s guaranteed to make the budgeting process easier, less stressful, and more effective. This updated edition features new information on service and nonprofit applications, types of financial models, Web-based budgeting and planning solutions, and much more. From preparing and presenting budgets to monitoring results against budget figures and handling any budget problem that comes up, this Second Edition is a go-to reference for every budgeting issue. Packed with case studies, illustrations, exhibits, forms, checklists, graphs, samples, and worked-out solutions to a wide variety of budgeting, planning, and control problems, this Second Edition is both a handy desk reference and problem-solver for today’s financial and nonfinancial managers in public practice and private industry.

Table of Contents:

1	The what and why of budgeting : an introduction	1
2	Strategic planning and budgeting : process, preparation and control	21
3	Administering the budget : reports, analyses, and evaluations	35
4	Break-even and contribution margin analysis : profit, cost, and volume changes	45
5	Profit planning : targeting and reaching achievable goals	63
6	Master budget : genesis of forecasting and profit planning	77
7	Cost behavior : emphasis on flexible budgets	95
8	Evaluating performance : the use of variance analysis	105
9	Manufacturing costs : sales forecasts and realistic budgets	155
10	Marketing : budgeting for sales, advertising, and distribution	167
11	Research and development : budgets for a long-term plan	185
12	General and administrative costs : budgets for maximum productivity	197
13	Capital expenditures : assets to be bought, sold, and discarded	201
14	Forecasting and planning : reducing risk in decision making	227
15	Moving averages and smoothing techniques : quantitative forecasting	235
16	Regression analysis : popular sales forecast system	245
17	Cash budgeting and forecasting cash flow : two pragmatic methods	255
18	Financial modeling : tools for budgeting and profit planning	267
19	Software packages : computer-based models and spreadsheet software	279
20	Capital budgeting : selecting the optimum long-term investment	291
21	Zero-base budgeting : priority budgeting for best resource allocation	331
22	Managers' performance : evaluation on the division level	339
23	Budgeting for service organizations : special features	359