Negotiating Team Budgets

If a ₹5 biscuit can tell us everything, why can’t a ₹100 crore road? I recently came across this thought-provoking visual-and it struck a chord. In fact, I’ve seen something similar already implemented on several PWD roads in Kerala, where boards display the cost, contractor, and responsible engineers involved in a public works project. That’s transparency. That’s accountability. And that’s exactly what we need nationwide. Why this matters: A ₹5 Parle-G biscuit packet gives you: Manufacturer Batch number License details Expiry date A ₹100 crore road? Often no clue who built it, how much it cost, or who's accountable for its failure. Imagine if every road had: A QR code on a board at regular intervals Scannable info on: Name of the contractor Date of completion Cost incurred Responsible government department Supervising engineers and ministers This is not a futuristic dream-it’s a reality in progressive states like Kerala. So why not scale it across India? As per Kerala PWD's 2023 circular, all major road works must display: Project name Contractor details Total sanctioned cost Start and end dates Contact number for grievance redressal These boards are common on NH, SH, and PMGSY roads in the state. A suggestion for India: Let’s treat public infrastructure like public information. Taxpayer money deserves traceability-whether it’s for a bridge, a hospital, or a highway. Let’s build roads you can drive on and trust. #Transparency #Accountability #GoodGovernance #KeralaModel #PublicInfrastructure #DigitalIndia #RoadSafety #NHAI #PMGSY #TaxpayerMoney #LinkedInIndia #IndiaDeservesBetter #QRcodeInitiative

New paper THE "SMALL IS SAFE" MYTH IS RUINING YOUR PORTFOLIO Conventional project management wisdom – and most governance frameworks – relies on a simple, lazy assumption: budget size is a reliable proxy for risk. If a project's budget is small, we assume it is "safe". We exempt it from external risk reviews, intense scrutiny, and deep contingency planning. For example, the Danish government recently raised the budget threshold for excusing IT projects from external risk reviews from $1.5 million to $7.5 million. They are completely wrong. In our new paper, my co-authors (Fioralba Ajazi, Daniel Nickelsen, Jens Schmidt, Maria Christodoulou) and I analyzed a large dataset of 5,094 IT projects. The results are a wake-up call for practitioners: 1. Small is not safe: The smallest 20% of IT projects have the worst cost performance of any group, with a mean cost overrun of no less than 192%, in real terms. 2. Wild risk is real: Tail-risk analysis shows that the smallest projects suffer from the most extreme tail risk (α=0.874, which is the lowest α-value we've ever measured for any project type, implying the highest risk). 3. There's a "double burden" of incompetence: Small projects are typically staffed by junior, inexperienced teams. The Dunning-Kruger effect dictates that a lack of experience simultaneously makes a task more difficult and inflates optimism bias. They literally do not know what they do not know. Stop letting budget size dictate your management attention. A tiny project, left unmonitored and under-resourced, is a ticking time bomb. Free pdf with the paper, here: https://lnkd.in/eTQrB5ct Comments very welcome, kindly help share 🙏

You can sense it. So can your team. But no one wants to say it out loud. The risk. The assumption. The thing that could sink the project. Most leaders surface them in a post-mortem. After the budget is blown. After the deadlines slip. After the damage is done. By then, it’s too late. Consider another option and run a pre-mortem. Instead of asking “Why did this fail?” Ask “It’s 12 months later. It failed. What went wrong?” That shift matters. Because our brains trick us. We discount the future. We overvalue today. Psychologists call it hyperbolic discounting (h/t to Adam Grant for raising this again recently). A pre-mortem breaks the bias. It makes the future feel urgent now. It forces leaders to name the risk before it’s real. And the payoff is huge: → Save money: Failures cost 3–10x more to fix after launch. → Save time. Issues surface early when they’re cheapest to solve. → Make money. Projects stay resilient and ROI becomes predictable. Think of it as one hour of pre-mortem saving 100 hours of rework. Here's the Pre-Mortem Playbook to help your team walk through this process. It's a 90-minute agenda any leader can run: 1. Assemble the right people 2. Frame the failure 3. Capture risks fast 4. Rank and prioritise 5. Convert to safeguards 6. Monitor relentlessly Simple. Practical. Insanely valuable. Because optimism isn't a strategy. So don’t ask: “Do we have time for this?” Ask: “Can we afford not to?” --------------------------------- 📸 Screenshot this cheatsheet to review it later ♻️ Repost this to help others, too. And follow Phil Hayes-St Clair for more. 📌 Want cheat sheets like this each week? Subscribe to my free newsletter: https://philhsc.com

𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗷𝗲𝗰𝘁 𝗶𝘀 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝗯𝘂𝗱𝗴𝗲𝘁. 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗽𝗹𝗮𝗻𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘄𝗮𝘀 𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆. Let’s stop pretending surprises are the problem. In my work as a PM coach and AI strategist, I see the same silent cost killers across industries and domains. If you're serious about preventing budget blowouts—start here 👇 𝟭. 𝗩𝗮𝗴𝘂𝗲 𝗥𝗲𝗾𝘂𝗶𝗿𝗲𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘀 ↳ If the goals aren’t clear, neither are the numbers. 👉 Clarity isn't optional. It's the foundation of budget integrity. 𝟮. 𝗢𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗶𝘀𝗺 𝗕𝗶𝗮𝘀 𝗶𝗻 𝗘𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 ↳ “Best-case scenario” isn’t a budget. It’s a trap. 👉 Historical data + pessimism + AI = your best shot at accuracy. 𝟯. 𝗜𝗴𝗻𝗼𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗛𝗶𝗱𝗱𝗲𝗻 𝗖𝗼𝘀𝘁𝘀 ↳ Integration. Training. Stakeholder churn. Rework. 👉 Out of sight ≠ , out of scope. Name them. Cost them. 𝟰. 𝗡𝗼 𝗖𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗴𝗲 𝗕𝘂𝗱𝗴𝗲𝘁 ↳ The scope will change. Budget should too. 👉 Add a formal change reserve—or prepare for firefighting. 𝟱. 𝗪𝗲𝗮𝗸 𝗥𝗶𝘀𝗸 𝗖𝗼𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 ↳ Risks are registered. But are they costed? 👉 Great PMs budget for risk like CFOs budget for downturns. 🔁 𝗕𝗢𝗡𝗨𝗦: 𝗕𝘂𝗱𝗴𝗲𝘁 𝗪𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗡𝗼 𝗢𝘄𝗻𝗲𝗿 ↳ “Finance owns the numbers.” “PM owns the plan.” 👉 Translation: No one owns the result. Fix that first. 💡 Budget overruns aren’t fate. They’re friction. And with modern tools—especially AI—we can now identify and mitigate cost drivers before they escalate. Curious how? That’s what I coach. 👇 𝗗𝗿𝗼𝗽 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗯𝗶𝗴𝗴𝗲𝘀𝘁 𝗯𝘂𝗱𝗴𝗲𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗹𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗼𝗻 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘀. 💬 𝗟𝗲𝘁’𝘀 𝗰𝗿𝗼𝘄𝗱𝘀𝗼𝘂𝗿𝗰𝗲 𝘄𝗶𝘀𝗱𝗼𝗺 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘀𝗮𝘃𝗲𝘀 𝗺𝗼𝗻𝗲𝘆. ♻️ Repost to help PMs control costs without killing team morale. 💾 Save this post for later—it’s your quick checklist for budget sanity. ➕ And follow Markus Kopko ✨ for more. #projectmanagement #budgetcontrol #pmcoach

How to Control Project Cost I believe this is the moment every project manager must face the truth: projects don’t fail suddenly, they bleed slowly. Cost overruns don’t explode overnight; they grow silently when numbers are ignored, assumptions go unchecked, and discipline fades. Studies show nearly 70% of projects exceed their original budgets, and the average overrun is 28%. That is not a budgeting issue—it is a leadership issue. When you control cost, you control confidence, credibility, and momentum. Cost control is not about saying “no” to spending; it is about saying “yes” to intelligent decisions, backed by data and clarity. The most powerful project managers don’t guess; they measure. Projects that invest time in structured cost planning are 2.5 times more likely to finish within budget. Accurate estimates, realistic contingencies, and clear cost ownership turn chaos into control. When teams know where every dollar is going, decision-making speeds up by 33%, and waste drops sharply. Cost control starts before the first task begins—it starts with mindset, precision, and discipline. High-Quality Project Management Templates & Documents: https://lnkd.in/dCGqF98z Once the project starts, tracking becomes your lifeline. Real-time cost monitoring reduces overruns by 22%, according to industry data. Tools like Earned Value Management give you early warning signals—when CPI drops below 0.9, the project is already in danger. High-performing teams review cost data weekly, not monthly, catching issues while they are still small and fixable. Cost visibility creates certainty, and certainty creates speed. Change is another silent budget killer. Research shows 52% of cost overruns come from uncontrolled scope changes. Strong change control does not slow projects down—it protects them. Every approved change must answer one question clearly: what is the cost impact? Projects with formal change approval processes save an average of 15–20% in total cost. Control does not limit creativity; it directs it. Risk-based cost control separates average managers from elite leaders. Projects that actively quantify cost risks perform 31% better than those that rely on static budgets. When risks are priced early and contingency is planned, surprises lose their power. Add smart procurement strategies, and organizations save another 10–15% through better contracts and vendor alignment. Finally, forecasting turns cost control into foresight. Projects that forecast Estimate at Completion identify problems 2–3 months earlier, giving leaders time to act, not react. Cost control is not cost cutting—it is cost intelligence. And intelligence always wins. 👉 Take control of your projects with High-Quality Project Management Templates & Documents: https://lnkd.in/dCGqF98z #ProjectManagement #CostControl #ProjectCost #PMLeadership #EarnedValue #BudgetManagement #Template22

Basic governance isn’t optional — it’s the frontline defence against corruption. When a national budget starts to smell, it’s usually because someone doesn’t want the public to see what’s really going on. The 2025 PNG Budget is exactly that scenario. Instead of investment in people, essential services, or genuine nation-building, we’re watching billions of kina funnelled into large contracts and programs with almost zero transparency. Prioritising opaque mega-projects over basic accountability is not just bad governance — it’s dangerous. Even the most elementary beneficial ownership regime would expose how many of the companies benefiting from Connect PNG and other major contracts trace straight back to MPs and political associates. That’s not speculation — it’s what every anti-corruption and financial governance system in the world is designed to prevent. Opposition MP James Nomane has raised the exact concerns any responsible government should already be addressing. His call for transparency is not political — it’s democratic. A K28.4 billion budget, and only K1.5 billion (5.2%) is visible at district level through DSIP. The rest? Untraceable to the people who actually rely on services. That is the definition of inequity. Nomane is right: • Citizens deserve to know where the money went. • They deserve to know which companies were paid, for what work, and in which districts. • They deserve access to the IFMS Vendors Payment List, MYEFO, and FBO that actually disclose recipients, not just broad allocations. And importantly, the Public Finance Management Act 2022 (s.3(2)) already requires quarterly reporting. Transparency is not a favour — it’s the law. If K1.6 billion went to Connect PNG, then show the public the contracts. Show the contractors. Show the beneficial owners. Show the work delivered. If there’s nothing to hide, then nothing should be hidden. Good governance is simple: • Open books. • Open contracts. • Open reporting. • Open accountability. PNG will never break the cycle of corruption and inequality while billions disappear into black boxes controlled by ministers, departments and political networks. Integrity isn’t a slogan — it’s transparency in action. Read more: (PNGfacts article) https://lnkd.in/gt8whakC

Every project has blind spots. Pre-mortems bring them into the light. Most teams run headfirst into new projects fueled by optimism. Kickoff decks, ambitious timelines, motivational speeches. It feels good. But optimism has a dark side: it hides risk. And when risks stay hidden, they cost you millions later. That’s why the smartest leaders run pre-mortems. Instead of waiting for failure to write a post-mortem, they write it before the project even begins. They ask: “If this project were to fail, how would it happen?” Here’s why it matters: Why: Humans suffer from “optimism bias.” We assume best-case outcomes and ignore weak links. Pre-mortems force a shift from fantasy to foresight. What: A pre-mortem is a structured session where the team imagines the project has already failed. They brainstorm every possible reason—internal or external—that led to that failure. How: You then design guardrails: contingency budgets, phased milestones, control mechanisms, and stakeholder strategies that prevent those failures from ever materializing. Six questions to run with your team: What could cause this project to fail completely? Where could we overspend or blow past timelines? What external factors (market, regulatory, political) could derail us? What assumptions are we making that could prove false? Which stakeholders could block progress or withdraw support? What signals would warn us we’re heading toward failure—before it’s too late? Pre-mortems don’t kill ambition—they protect it. They don’t reduce creativity—they harden it. Because the leaders who see blind spots early aren’t pessimists. They’re the ones who finish. — Raj Brar, Global Deal Strategist

🎯 "If I do budgeting the same way again next year, fire me." After almost half a dozen roundtables with finance and CFOs, I collected some spicy takeaways to help you budget better without losing your sanity—or your weekends: 💡 Don't make the the budget into a single, "big bang" event Multi-year outlooks and long range plans -> detailed annual plans -> frequent rolling forecasts to create a continuous planning cycle. 🔄 Trigger-Based Budgeting Why re-budget everything every year? Set triggers based on whether your assumptions have changed. If nothing changes, neither should your outlook. One company cut effort by 20% annually using this method. 📊 Driver-Based Models FTW Orient your models around P&L, balance sheet, and cash flow drivers. 📐 Top-Down vs. Bottom-Up: The W Dance Most orgs do a “W” negotiation—budget goes up, comes down, goes up again. Some are skipping the negotiations and just maintaining YOY goals; others warn about unrealistic top-down targets can crush morale faster than a surprise audit. 🤝 Finance ≠ Budget Police Finance facilitates, not dictates. Ownership belongs with the business units. Your job is to control the money, not the people. 🧠 Risk Management = Cone of Uncertainty Stress test assumptions, visualize upside/downside, and embrace scenario planning. Because reality doesn’t care about your spreadsheet. 📣 Final Mantra “Change is not a threat to the plan—it’s part of the planning process.” Discipline in the process. Agility in the execution. 💬 What budgeting practice has saved your team the most time or pain? Drop it in the comments—let’s build a smarter FP&A community together. #FPAC #Budgeting #FinancialPlanning #FPAAC #FinanceHumor #CorporateFinance #AFP2025 #AgileFinance #BryanLapidus #FP&A #Leadership #CareerGrowth

Here are five ideas to meaningfully improve risk management in your company this year. Not compliance theater. Not more documentation. Things that actually change decisions and deliver measurable results. One. Pick one important decision and model it properly. Think big, execute small. The biggest return on investment in risk management almost always comes from dealing with one decision really well, not from building an enterprise-wide framework. Pick a recurring decision — project approval, capital allocation, supplier selection — and introduce uncertainty ranges before the next one is made. One decision done well changes more minds than a hundred workshops. Two. Replace single-point estimates with ranges in your budget. Wherever your planning process uses a single number, replace it with three: optimistic, expected, and pessimistic. Not as a footnote. As the main output. "Budget is ten million, plus or minus one point five million at 80% confidence" is honest. "Budget is ten million" is fiction. This single change, applied consistently, dramatically improves forecast accuracy over time. Three. Model your insurance loss history before your next renewal. Most companies accept their broker's recommendation with minor adjustments. A logistics company that simply analyzed five years of claims data in Excel saved two hundred and fifty-five thousand dollars annually — increasing deductibles on high-frequency small losses while adding meaningful cyber coverage. Your renewal is probably within the next twelve months. Start now. Four. Run a Monte Carlo simulation on your next major project schedule and budget. You do not need expensive software. Basic Monte Carlo runs in Excel and on top of Microsoft Project. Take your project cost and timeline estimates, replace them with distributions, and run ten thousand scenarios. The output will almost certainly show that your contingency reserve is either too low or allocated to the wrong risks. That information, before the project kicks off, is worth more than any risk register. Five. Stop scheduling risk assessments. Start scheduling decision reviews. Map the significant decisions your organization will make in the next six months. Assign risk analysis to each one, timed to happen before the decision is finalized. Cancel the quarterly risk review that nobody uses and replace it with a decision calendar. Same effort, radically different value.

🏥 A Hospital That Exists Only on Paper: When Infrastructure Becomes an Illusion Imagine allocating public money for a 100-bed government hospital. Imagine appointing staff, processing salaries, maintaining official records, and treating the project as "operational." Now imagine there is no hospital building. No beds. No patients. No bricks. Reports surrounding a proposed 100-bed hospital in Indore have sparked serious concerns about governance, accountability, and the way public infrastructure projects are monitored. If these reports are accurate, the project has reportedly remained non-existent on the ground for years while official records continued to reflect progress. This isn't just about one hospital. It's about a larger question: How can infrastructure exist in government records but not in reality? Healthcare is one of the most critical public services. Every delayed hospital means delayed treatment. Every unfinished project represents thousands of citizens who continue to travel farther, wait longer, or go without adequate medical care. Even more concerning are reports suggesting that employees were assigned and salaries continued to be paid despite the absence of a functioning hospital. If established through proper investigation, such practices would raise fundamental questions about financial oversight, administrative accountability, and audit mechanisms. Taxpayers don't fund projects for paperwork. They fund them to save lives. This incident, if verified, highlights why governments need: • Transparent project tracking that citizens can access. • Regular independent infrastructure audits. • Public disclosure of project milestones and expenditure. • Strong accountability for delays, irregularities, or misuse of public funds. • Digital records that reflect on-ground reality—not just administrative entries. Infrastructure should not exist only in files. Hospitals should be measured by the number of patients they serve—not by the number of documents they generate. Public trust is built when promises become buildings, budgets become services, and announcements become outcomes. India deserves healthcare infrastructure that exists in reality—not just in government databases. #Healthcare #PublicHealth #HealthcareInfrastructure #Governance #Accountability #Transparency #PublicPolicy #Infrastructure #India #Indore #MadhyaPradesh #TaxpayerMoney #GoodGovernance #Audit #PublicAdministration #Government #HealthcareReform #Leadership #Ethics #SocialImpact