>> ?+?+?+Contingency™=The Date™.
I've always had a strong feeling that my strong feeling about when something will be done is fairly accurate. Decomposing that into ?+?+?+Contingency for the client tends to be the hard part.
I've always had a strong feeling that my strong feeling about when something will be done is fairly accurate. Decomposing that into ?+?+?+Contingency for the client tends to be the hard part.
mpg * terrain factor * safety factor
it's pretty important to him to get his estimates right, so he is rather serious about this.
Assuming your 'gut feeling' is pretty accurate (I suspect it is), you could probably break it down into:
- these components will take X days,
- getting them to work together is an extra Y,
- contingency factor is Z
I honestly don't understand how your gut feeling could be accurate unless you had a well developed sense of those factors, or some similar breakdown of what it takes to deliver a project and where the complexities/unknowns are.
It's like cooking.
Okay... yes, ingredients, preparation, bake time... you have to take each into account. It can be hazy when you're estimating 6 months or 8 months, because you're not sure how it will come together after the first 4. That's true, for something that large.