Project taking me MUCH longer than budgeted for

[boredempl]

I have a project which is budgeted to take me approximately 5 hours, including going through our internal review process and external review process twice.

It has taken me a lot longer. I told the project manager and they gave me another 5 hours in the budget, but it's still not enough. I've worked late on it a lot, it's probably taken me 20+ hours. I've had to push the deadline back a few times, so I've been quite open and transparent about the scale of the project. It's the kind of thing where unless you're the only sitting doing it, you don't realise how meticulous and detailed it is and how long it takes.

I'm feeling frustrated because in the original brief from the client I was told to do something a particular way, and then I'm now being told they have changed their mind about that element so I need to do it 'the old way' and that is going to take me ages to 1) Undo what I've done, and 2) Redo it in the 'old way' all with no left money in the budget

My manager is also adding to my workload, he told me the clients want every single update/change highlighted with an annotation describing what we've done and why. So I did that, it was painfully tedious and now the client has said (quite rightly) that there is way too much information for them to read through, and can we just summarise the overall jist of the changes.

I also have phase two of this project starting this week, I've had a quick look at it and it looks like the same, if not worse, than this project.

I need to email the project manager and my manager about this project but I'm not really sure how to go about it. I'm quite new in my role so haven't had to deal with this issue before. I'm working as quickly as I can but the scale of the project is way beyond the brief

Okay, so this is a charged project for an external client?

If so, whoever negotiated and sold it has fucked up massively. If you weren't the one who sold it or agreed the parameters, you need to have a meeting with the project manager and/or project lead asap and tell them that the agreed budget for the project is wildly inadequate. Somebody should be managing the client and telling them that if they want extensive documentation AND then to change their minds midstream, they have to pay for it. Ten hours of work time is nothing.

Either whoever sold the project is on glue, the organisation really has no experience with selling this kind of project, or the organisation is toxic and underbills clients to win work and then dumps the delivery onto people they can armtwist into sucking up the unbilled time. Which seems most likely to you?

Basically, you need to ask your manager and the project manager how to handle the fact that this project is going to run at a massive loss. It's their decision not yours. They can either tell you that they'll renegotiate with the client or that you need to write this one off in the interests of the broader relationship. If they imply that you "should" have been able to deliver all of it in the allotted ten hours, ask them sweetly for detailed guidance on how that would have been possible, for next time.

I'm nervous to submit my timesheets as I know I've gone way over budget. But I have been trying to say that it's taking way longer than expected

It's a known thing with this client that we often work above our budget for the interest of the long-term relationship we have with them

Today I've had feedback from the client and I needed to have finished it by tomorrow morning for my manager to then look, I've worked up until 10pm tonight and I'm still nowhere near done. I just can't do it anymore. The project is really bringing me down, it's the type of thing that's really detailed and nitty gritty and I'm bored to tears with it and have started making silly mistakes as I just can't focus on it

“ hen I'm now being told they have changed their mind about that element so I need to do it 'the old way' and that is going to take me ages to 1) Undo what I've done, and 2) Redo it in the 'old way' all with no left money in the budget”

If client is requesting changes then you do a trend or scope change for additional hours for client sign off. Manager should have explained whatever process you have at work. I’d you can justify your hours due to changes made by either client or manager just note it all down

Sounds really tough.

I echo the previous posters’ advice.

Ensure that your timesheets are accurate and reflect your overtime - you’re not doing anyone a favour by rounding it down.

Who is responsible for liaising with the client?

I'll email my manager first thing tomorrow

The project manager liases with the client, I have no contact with them. They are a notoriously difficult client though, and this project has already had its budget increased

It's hard because I'm new so I'm second-guessing myself too and wondering whether I'm just too slow. But then I think logically and read the budget carefully and I've done 10x the amount of work budgeted for e.g. say we budgeted for 5 pages, I've had to do 50

If you were self-employed and found yourself in this position you would have to renegotiate. You need to speak up at all stages where it's taking you longer. But - serious question - if it's taking you SO much longer than budgeted for are you sure you're in the right job? Are you possibly giving far more info than is needed?

Or projects tend to run into weeks and months not hours, but the premise is the same. You need to ask your manager what is the process when you go over budget by more that whatever tolerance authority you have. Hopefully you should be able to tell them well before that you estimate you will go well over budget so they can either guide you if you are doing more than is required, review the budget, review the deliverables or have the excess absorbed internally if there had been a cock up with estimates. Any changes to the original requirements that will impact budget should have an escalation point too.

In our company no one would go so far beyond budget without escalating and getting input.