Budget holder or budget owner is someone in the company, typically a manager, C-level manager or a director, who is accountable for spending decisions in the area of their responsibility.
Who is a typical budget owner in a company?
In a small company, it is usually the owner or the director. The bigger the company, the more this authority is spread among different levels of management - among more managers or directors. The company’s budged represents actually the company’s revenue and expenditure plan. To ensure that the approval of individual spendings is not central and takes place at the level that is the most likely to make the right decision, the planned expenditures are divided in a certain proportion between the executive directors or senior managers who have the authority to make spending decisions in the scope of “their” portion of the budget - ie. decisions about purchases, investments and the like.
A project manager, also, can be regarded as the budget owner because he or she is in charge of making spending decisions concerning the project. However, a typical budget owner is a C-level manager who is in charge of a particular functional part of an organization or an organizational unit, such as:
- marketing and sales (the Chief Sales Officer (CSO) is the budget owner)
- production (the Production Director is the budget owner)
- human resources (the Chief Human Resources Officer (CHRO) is the budget owner)
- security (the security manager is the budget owner)
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