Service firms: risk management of time and money

For most service-driven firms (such as ad agencies or PR firms) there are two things the leaders of client teams need to be constantly risk managing: the time and money allocated to a project. Successful management of these two elements has a direct bearing on the profitability (ROI) of a project.

Furthermore you must be proactive about risk managing these vital commodities.  By that we mean your account leaders need to know (on at least a weekly basis) where they stand in terms of burn rate.  To risk manage accurately means they must have the mechanism in place to understand how much of the budget (resources) has been expended against getting the task done (time).  This mechanism will need to be an institutionalized system otherwise you will have garbage in......

Not risk managing means that you are likely to be having the Oliver conversation ("Please Sir, may I have some more...)" with your client.  And this is never a pleasant conversation - especially if your people have squandered the time and money.

Decision-making is a key component of the risk management process.  But more on that later.