What We Can Learn from Tolstoy about FMIS

a post by Moritz Piatti-Fünfkirchen (Senior Economist at the World Bank) and Ali Hashim (a former Lead Treasury Systems Specialist, World Bank) published in The International Monetary Fund’s Public Financial Management Blog



When Leo Tolstoy wrote Anna Karenina about 150 years ago, he inspired generations. His novel begins

“All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”

Now, what does this have to do with Financial Management Information Systems (FMIS)? What Tolstoy perhaps meant was that a deficiency in any one of a host of factors dooms an endeavor to failure. Consequently, to make an endeavor successful it is necessary to mitigate against deficiencies and risks in multiple areas.

In a recent World Bank Policy Research Working Paper (click here to access the paper) the authors developed a framework that lays out three critical dimensions for an FMIS to contribute to improved budget management:

1. the diagnostic phase,
2. the system’s lifecycle, and
3. the system’s coverage and utilization.

The diagnostic phase covers a review of relevant PFM deficiencies, the legal and institutional framework, control protocols, and business processes.

The system lifecycle lays out what it takes to make an FMIS operational.

Lastly, the coverage and utilization of an FMIS will determine its scope and effectiveness.

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