The Problem with Disjointed Budgeting

Successful project management should always be deeply rooted in the budgeting process. Unfortunately, for a variety of reasons, most project managers lose touch with their budgets during the project process. The consequences of this disconnect are often dramatic; projects rarely finish within their agreed scope, businesses lose money, clients lose their tempers and when the pattern continues, companies fall.

Project managers commonly end up with fractured processes. Budgets are built simply for the sake of protocol rather than to guide and control the project. Often, the budget’s left gathering dust in the corner of some MacBook’s folder. Management can’t find the information they need and any other project managers working on the project have to go through hours of back and forth emailing to get anything done. Resourcing and budgeting are two processes that should be inexorably linked, they should feed into one another seamlessly, keeping up with the needs of each other.

This disconnect can be particularly evident for project managers who work with creatives. Creatives come up with such brilliant ideas that it’s easy to get attached to the concept and lose sight of the budget. Sacrificing profit margins in favour of whichever creative idea has gripped everyone’s attention is common in the creative project management world.

There’s an integral problem with running your budgets from a platform that isn’t connected. Budgets aren’t secure or easily shareable. The disjointed Excel spreadsheets that we’re all so used to are often filled with errors. The ever-present awareness of risks to budgeting formulae add extra stress and lead project managers to connect their budgets with pain, creating a subconscious barrier. Worse, the inability to share line by line budget details and up to the second costs from a communal platform leaves project managers isolated and alone.

Problem: Disconnect across the company

Solution: Implement companywide processes

Using different methodologies across one company leaves you wide open to error. Project managers shouldn’t be able to hide their projects, yet we’ve seen many companies where the leaders aren’t given access to their teams’ actual costs until the last minute. The extra time necessary to put together a companywide process is worth it, having everything organised fastidiously gives management a great platform from which to ensure their budgets aren’t overrun and their team is transparent. Dedicating some time to reviewing and measuring the success for the current processes will assist long term company growth. Ensuring everyone’s working under the same understanding will make a measurable difference to the team’s ability to quickly and accurately catch project overspends. Put all of your information on one platform where everyone can access the latest version of a budget and the most up to date costs of projects.

Problem: Disjointed and risky budgeting.

Resolution: Get project budgeting software.

Project budgeting software controls and guides the budgeting process. It prevents overspend, displays actual costs at a live rate and massively lowers risk. With everything on the cloud, multiple users can work together on one project, giving teams the space to collaborate. Like project management software, project budgeting software is fully integrated, giving users the ability to complete timesheets, raise POs and invoices, forecast future costs and profit as well as carry out resourcing from one platform. With line by line cost updates as well as project and companywide live reporting project budgeting software takes away the stress of disjointed budgeting.

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