rganizations operating concurrent fiscal and calendar years, school, and budgeting start around the same time. Usually the business plan and budget goes to the board or owner in December. Well-laid plans get approved; lousy plans become the root of contention and revision during the holiday season. Most organizations don't enter a new fiscal year without a board-approved operating plan for the next year. Communications budgeting and planning involves only the expense and asset accounts in the system. This is the time and place to get new inputs into budgeting and operating practices, as well as organ- ize new parameters in operating and capital expenditures. Regard- less of reporting structure, it is strongly recommended that communications cost management be accounted for as a departmen- tal peer to other operating functions such as sales, marketing, ac- counting, management information systems/information technology (MIS/IT), etc. Alternatively, it can be part of MIS/IT if all subac- counts are properly structured and their entries classified appropri- ately. But care must be taken to keep the two separated and well defined, because of the potential for, and sometimes outright, dupli- cation of resources or empire building. Missing an opportunity to acquire a new operational capability is also possible as well. This is the syndrome known as the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing. Good budgeting and planning practice uses previous years' actual results as a foundation on which to build the next year's plan. Overall, the process involves studying and understanding previous years' history, followed by development and analysis of alternative scenarios. Reports of actual expenditures by category, department, and location covering the past year are the critical starting point. These reports should come from accounting on a regular monthly basis. Excellence in budgeting and planning practice dovetails with and leverages successful long-range business and strategic planning. (That's the subject of Chapt