Cost overrun, schedule overrun, and benefits shortfalls have been constant in projects for the past 100 years. This is due to a strategy called strategic misrepresentation, where planners intentionally underestimate cost and overestimate benefits to increase their chances of getting funded. Even Nobel Prize winner Danny Kahneman endorses this strategy, as realistic presentations are found uninteresting and require some degree of over promising.
Whether it’s a giant infrastructure plan or a humble kitchen renovation, it’ll inevitably take way too long and cost way too much. That’s because you suffer from “the planning fallacy.” (You also have an “optimism bias” and a bad case of overconfidence.) But don’t worry: we’ve got the solution.