Estimating the Unknown: Dates or Budgets, Part 1


And, some managers want you to estimate the budget as well as the date. And now, you're off into la-la land. Look, if you had any predictive power, you'd be off somewhere gambling, making a ton of money. But, you do have options. All of them require iterating on the estimates and the project.

First, a couple of cautions:



Project Pyramid





14 Replies to “Estimating the Unknown: Dates or Budgets, Part 1”

  1. I like your “project pyramid”. It gives another picture to point at and have a conversation. You explain that the outside edges are corporate constraints. What would you call the inside edges (Low defects, etc)?

    1. The inside edges are what the customer wants: A specific feature set, at a reasonable level of quality by a certain date.

  2. How do you deal with the case in which a consulting firm is asked to provide a fixed-price bid on a solution? Their goal is to make a profit, so they absolutely can’t underestimate. On the other hand, they are in competition with other firms, so they can’t add too much of a cushion. There seems to be a force that is driving these firms to start with a low-ball estimate to win the contract, and then beg for mercy when the budget runs out and the project is only half done. What is your advice for the consulting firms, and the customers of those firms?

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  4. Pingback: Estimating the Unknown: Dates or Budgets, Part 1 | Managing Product Development | Brain Dump

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