Guessing is not a strategy: How to build decision velocity with AI and real-time data
June 10, 2026 | Live Webinar
Get Your Project Team Funded
Tom's latest eBook has been released on Amazon: "The 7 Myths of IT Integrations". Tom is also a Program Director for a large Midwest corporation and has been an adjunct faculty member at Walsh College. He has managed global web initiatives, data center moves and large multi-million dollar programs.
Creating a budget for a project is sometimes a challenge (okay, most times). As a project manager approaching a new project, you may want to dispel some of the murkiness around what a project will cost before itemizing out a more formal, detailed project materials bill. To get that first level of clarity usually relies upon techniques of varying levels of difficulty.
Hardware cost, for example, may be gleaned from a vendor’s website, and the same is sometimes true for the software. When we get to our human resource cost estimates for a project, there tends to be just as many ways of getting there as there PMs who do it. The following technique is what I have used for several years on my projects.
Budgetary Resource Estimates
The key point to understand is that I am looking for a budgetary figure. “Budgetary” does not mean “exact”. It means it is a first pass at adding some level of form to something that I previously knew nothing about. I need the additional clarity to continue communicating and negotiating with my stakeholders. No need to be quantum physics precise just yet. It’s not necessary, but I do need to be in the ballpark.
I have found that the right level of detail starts at a full-time equivalent (FTE) level or some portion of an FTE. Basically I ask myself, “How much of a given resource do I …
Please log in or sign up below to read the rest of the article.
ADVERTISEMENTS
|
"If only God would give me some clear sign! Like making a large deposit in my name at a Swiss bank." - Woody Allen |