What is a Cash Book?

• A cash book is a system to help you organise your finances – it is a simple record in which you can record all payments made and income received.
• Cash books can be kept manually, as a spread sheet on a pc, or in a computerised system
• A cash book tells you; how much money has been paid into the bank, where the money came from, what cheques have been paid out, to whom and for what, the total for the month or year for specific purposes
• It’s important to start your cash book correctly and maintain it regularly - this will help make it easier for you to manage your finances and also assist those assessing your financial situation.
• A well kept cash book can also help you work out your cash flow needs for the year (cash flow budget), your end of year financial accounts and tax returns.

How to Operate a Cash book Checklist

• use a cash book with as many columns as you think you will need – in a hand-written system, a 16-column book is best
• start each month on a new page (or spreadsheet)
• use the income and receipt columns that are most relevant to your organisation
• where possible, have separate columns for expenses that occur frequently
• make sure you write (or enter) the cheque number in the cash book – this makes it easier to reconcile with the bank statement
• if you are GST registered, set up separate columns for GST paid and received (manual cash books are more appropriate for smaller groups that are not GST registered)
• when you receive your bank statement, enter any automatic payments, bank fees or other items that appear on the bank statement
• add all the columns up at the end of the month and make sure the total of the “income” columns equals “receipts”, and the total of the “expenditure” columns equals “payments”
• balancing the cash book will double-check your figures - the “expenditure” columns should add up to the “payments” column and the “income” columns should add up to the “receipts” column.

For more information on this topic and to see an example please click on this link - Cashbook

Effective Meetings:

• Well run meetings save a lot of time and can help you and/ or your group to achieve your goals.
• For a meeting to be effective it is important to have a clear agenda and a meeting process that everyone can understand.
• It is important to keep minutes to record all motions and decisions - well recorded minutes make it easier for your organisation to keep track of decisions, and provide a reliable record of your group’s activities.
• Effective minutes can help funding agencies assess funding applications, as decisions supporting your application are clearly identifiable.

Meeting Preparation:

To ensure a smooth running and successful meeting:

• make sure an appropriate meeting time and meeting space is confirmed and any specific requirements such as presentation equipment or catering requirements are booked ahead
• a notice of the meeting should be sent out in advance to enable people to make arrangements to attend
• as early as possible prior to the meeting documents such as the ‘Agenda’ , most recent ‘Minutes’ and any other required reading should be sent to members / meeting attendees to give them time to read

Meeting Roles and Processes Minute-taker

• person responsible for recording the ‘Minutes’ who clearly and concisely records all important aspects of the meeting from start to finish.
• ensures minutes include all the agreed decisions and tasks from meeting as well as the time, date and venue, names of those present, apologies, name of facilitator and minute-taker, purpose of meeting, matters for discussion, and time, venue and purpose of next meeting

Chairperson/ Facilitator

• person responsible for facilitating the smooth running of meetings who guides the meeting procedure 
• the chairperson/ facilitator; makes sure the meeting starts on time, welcomes members, organises opening & introductions, lists any agreed ground rules, reads and calls for apologies, advises of housekeeping details, allows time to add additional items to the agenda, keeps the group to the agenda and time-frame, facilitates discussions and clarifies ‘Actions’ (i.e. what is to be done by who and when)

Agenda: 

The agenda outlines what will be covered in the meeting. People attending the meeting should have an opportunity to contribute to the agenda before the agenda is completed and sent out. The Agenda is usually prepared by the meeting Chairperson and / or Secretary. 

A sample Agenda:

1.      Welcome and Opening
2.      Apologies
3.      Minutes of the previous meeting
4.      Matters arising from the minutes
5.      Correspondence
6.      Matters arising from the correspondence
7.      Formal Agenda Items
8.      General Business
9.      Reports (Financial etc…)
10.  Date for next meeting

Follow Up: 

After the meeting has finished, the following jobs need to be carried out:

• action plans and follow ups confirmed
• minutes checked by the chair or meeting organiser and the minute-taker
• the timeframe for circulation of minutes, new reports, background papers, and the next agenda arranged
• minutes circulated

For More information on this topic please follow this link -  Meetings

Project Planning

‘Project Planning’ is the work you do to plan your programme or activity so you can achieve it in an organised and efficient way


Why Plan? 

• planning each stage of a project before it happens helps “get the job done and helps you to achieve your goals
• if you’re responsible for a project, planning ahead may help your project to happen more easily
• it could help to save you or your group time, money, stress and in the worse case scenario, the failure of your project
• It may help you achieve the goals or targets set out in your Business or Operational Plan. See our quick fact sheet ‘How to Develop a Business Plan’
• it is important when you are applying for funding with a special project or programme in mind, to show that you’ve thought carefully about how you’re going to make your project happen - this will help the funding agency assessing your application to understand your goals and have more confidence in your project

Project Planning Stages

Stage One: ‘Starting Up’ your project  
work out what you want to do, what you need to do to get it done and how you will know whether you have achieved what you set out to do. At this point you can draft the ‘Terms of Reference’ for the project – i.e. write down the reasons for the project, and its ‘terms’ (what it involves)

Stage Two: Planning Your Project  
decide on the ‘specifics’ - the ‘what, when, why, how and who’?.  Create a chart or ‘project schedule’ for this activity
  
for simple projects create a simple ‘Action Plan’ listing: What needs to be done? What you need to do it? Who will do it? When will it be done by? What follow up is needed? 

     Project Budget

• estimate what costs are going to be involved to get the job done from start to finish (see our Fact Sheet on ‘How to Develop a Business Plan’). See page 5, Section 6 of the ‘Community Resource Kit’ www.community.net.nz
• think ahead about any budget ‘blow-outs’ that might occur
• identify possible sources of funding for your project – if you are unable to identify a funding source you may need to think about re-assessing your project objectives and scope in order to be eligible

     Monitoring and Reporting systems

• set up a simple system for monitoring and reporting on how the project is progressing, how the budget is going and any risks or issues to be dealt with – who do you need to inform?

     Risk Management Plan

• plan how you are going to manage any potential risks involved
• see page 16 – 17, Section 2 of the ‘Community Resource Kit’www.community.net.nz for further details on Risk Management planning

     Health and Safety / Hazard Management

• if you are organising a project such as an event, or using volunteers or contractors to implement a project, it is very important to know your responsibilities.
• for projects involving potential ‘Health and Safety’ risks – find out what your responsibilities are – see www.acc.co.nz for further information on Health and Safety and Hazard Management

     Communications Plan

• how to communicate with your ‘stakeholders’ (people with an interest in the project), the public and media about your project. To find out how to develop one see Section 9 of the ‘Community Resource Kit’www.community.net.nz

Stage Three: Implementing Your Project

• ensure you create simple systems to regularly monitor how your project is progressing, and  report progress back to group at regular meetings
• at this point you may start facing problems or ‘issues’ – if so ensure you ‘control’ them – e.g.: budget blow-outs, hold-ups - this is when your ‘Risk Management Plan’ becomes useful. If you didn’t count on the problem that is occurring – make sure you have a system to revise your plans if needed!.

Stage Four: Finishing your project

• at this stage your project is coming to a close, however there is still work to do
• finish off any outstanding jobs, work out what tasks need to be carried on, if any, and evaluate and report on your project

For more information of this topic please follow this link - Project

A Business Plan… 

• helps you to plan and achieve your activities for the year ahead (it can also be called an ‘Operational Plan’ or ‘Annual Plan’)
• is an annual ‘action’ plan with specific goals  - focusing on ‘what’ you want to achieve this year, ‘how’ you are going to achieve it, who will help, what you need to make it happen, and when
• should be looked at and discussed regularly, e.g. at monthly meetings, rather than filed away in a drawer somewhere

How to develop a Business Plan… 

• get everyone in your group together with a skilled group facilitator
• think about your group and what you want to plan– what is the purpose of the plan? Consider what is the main purpose of your group/ activity? do you have a ‘mission statement’ or ‘vision’?
• give everyone an opportunity to say what they think the group should achieve and why - use a whiteboard and/ or large pieces of paper and markers to write down your plans and sticky tape them to the wall  for everyone in the group to see while you’re all working on them
• If you don’t already have one –create a ‘Mission Statement’ consisting of one to four concise sentences representing your main purpose, your main activities and your values or beliefs - write this into the plan
• identify some realistic business goals for the year and write these up – make them ‘SMART’ – sustainable (lasting), measurable (how you measure you are meeting them), attainable, results focused, time bound 
• work out: who is responsible for actioning these goals, how long it should take them, what resources will they need, and how you will check on their progress - and then write this into the plan
• Next you need to work on your Cash Flow plan and your Financial Plan, as these are a part of your overall Business Plan (see our other Quick Fact sheets in this series for information on these).

For more information of this topic please follow this link - Business Plan

This Project Budget Template is a work sheet setting out Expenditure and Income of your project as per the TSB Community Trust Application Form.

Please click here:  Project Budget Template

Acknowledgements, Resources and Websites 

Some of the information in these fact sheets was reproduced or adapted with permission from Family and Community Services, Ministry of Social Development, the Funding Information Service and the Inland Revenue Department.  This information was sourced from: The ‘Community Resource Kit’ available on www.community.net.nz (a collaborative community information website full of valuable information for community groups). The Community Resource Kit was first published in October 2006 by Family and Community Services, Ministry of Social Development, P O Box 1556, Wellington, New Zealand and the Local Government and Community Branch, Department of Internal Affairs, P O Box 805, Wellington. ISBN 0-478-29339-9 The Inland Revenue’s / Te Tari Taake website www.ird.govt.nz and their IR 320 ‘Smart Business: a guide for businesses and non-profit organisations’ published in October 2005 by the Inland Revenue Department. Please note: the IRD also suggests you read their IR 254 ‘Clubs and Societies’ booklet to find out more about running a non-profit organisation. These booklets are available from their website or by telephoning IRD on 0800 377 774. The helpful range of ‘how to’ guides available from the Funding Information Service website on www.fis.org.nz .