Computing the project cost using our project management tools is a fundamental step in planning a project. Yet, I’ve found that some managers have a tough time when large numbers are involved or it is the first time they’ve ever seen an accurate overall cost of a project.

We had a COO who canceled an effort to put out a new version of our software product because “it was too costly.”  The humorous part was that the costs were not additive as we were using the people we already had. When she saw how much a two-year project was going to cost using a significant portion of 100 engineers she decided that it was “too much.”  We had no intention of letting anyone go and we were struggling to keep our staff from leaving in a competitive job market.

What were we doing with our staff?  One thing was “giving them away for free” to our customers to help fix their problems — even though we had agreements to charge them for our services.  Each day that went by was “costing” us the amount of the staff who continued to work on lower value, less revenue-generating, activities. Sitting on the balance sheet the staff looked reasonable for the company as a whole. Strangely, when they were associated with a specific project the cost looked prohibitive to the COO.  (Compare this to other unexpected project planning behaviors.)

We never did produce an updated product, though we had the staff to do it. The company was ultimately bought out by a competitor and the product line was retired as out-of-date (along with letting go of the senior staff and most of the engineers).  The staff cost was the inhibiting factor, but it was only inhibiting when the cost was associated with a project.

Cost is a fundamental factor in any project or product.  Getting the cost estimate right upfront may result in sticker shock.  We need to make sure we put the costs in perspective. We should always consider what we would gain by the project (ROI) and what we would not be able to do because we took on the project.  Getting the project management cost right involves seeing the whole plan and not just the cost figure.