Skills and Requirements
I’m fairly diverse in my skills - I’ve learned how to do a bunch of things over the years, and that experience has saved me (and made me) a lot of money. But it also cost me a lot of money. How’s that?
Believe it or not, Cutting corners on Requirements.
Here’s a low-tech example. When I do a weekend project that I am billing someone for, like building a deck or a shed, I’m usually pretty good at identifying all the necessary components of that project, and then including those in the project estimate. But when I’m working on something for myself, I tend to be a lot more “agile,” meaning, if I have a bunch of materials on hand and I want to build something, I just grab my tools and get started. In my head, I have all the stuff I need, so the project will be easy-peasy. But the problem is, if I haven’t thought through my own project, I am making constant trips back and forth to the store for supplies - like nails, screws, caulk, more boards, etc… I recently completed a project (a chicken coop) that I had “all” the materials for, and when I looked at the Lowes bill, I almost passed out.
Moral to the story here? Requirements are important in everything. Project overruns are a BIG deal - my little home project overrun was almost 1000$ - but if you’re working on a major contract, with lots of pieces and parts that have to all work out together, an overrun could cost in the millions.