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Estimate & budget
Price it before you sign it. Then watch it.
The estimator and the margin calculator sit above the projects rather than inside one, because you size an engagement before it exists. When it becomes real, the same numbers become the budget you are measured against.
Estimator
Pick the modules in scope and get hours, price, duration and gross margin out the other side. Creating a project from an estimate carries the module complexity straight into the plan as scope multipliers, so the plan starts where the estimate landed.
- Module list in, hours out
- Respects the advisory or delivery multiplier
- Returns duration, not just cost
- Shared across every project you run
Margin calculator
Test what a discount actually does. Rate, hour count, discount and cost of acquisition against your cost basis, so the answer to "can we take ten percent off" is a number rather than a feeling in the room.
- Rate and hours against real cost basis
- Discount modelled explicitly
- Acquisition cost included
- Answers the question before the call, not after
Budget
Four assumptions, and then arithmetic.
The budget tab does not ask you to maintain a second model. It takes the planned hours already in the WBS and applies your assumptions to them.
| Line | How it is calculated | Default |
|---|---|---|
| Labour | Planned hours × hourly rate | $250/hr |
| Travel & Expense | Labour × expense contingency | 10% |
| Scope Contingency | Labour × scope contingency | 15% |
| Planned vs Actual | By phase, from actual hours recorded on tasks | — |
Defaults are the shipped starting point. Every one of them is yours to change per project.
Planned against actual, by phase
Actual hours are recorded on tasks and roll up by phase. Design running 40% over while build runs under is a very different conversation from a project that is simply over, and the phase split is what makes that visible early enough to act on.
Why it sits above the project
Because you price things you do not win.
Estimator and margin calculator are shared tabs, not per-project ones. Size five opportunities, win two, and only those two ever become projects — without five abandoned workspaces to tidy up afterwards.