Balancing the Present Vs Future
As a senior leader holding a P&L, you hit every number this year. The capability you promised to build for next, however, is still a slide.
The budget you earmarked for Horizon 2, building your next wave of products (6-18 months) has been spent on Horizon 1 ( 0 - 6 months ). It went on contingencies: Two engineers for a sprint to land the release, infrastructure nobody budgeted for, a customer escalation that needs people on a plane, retention money for someone you cannot afford to lose this quarter.
Each is the right call on the day and the wrong one for the year.
Your managers are not being short-sighted. They are protecting what they are measured on this month, and the Horizon 2 budget carries no consequence anyone will feel before the review that judges them.
The consequence of this is
your next ask for budget becomes weaker
people decline to be part of your ambitions as they watched the last one dissolve
This is how you can balance present Vs future:
Separate the people along with the budget: Partial/ split resourcing always is easy to raid. Ensure the skills are different across horizons. Also the performance measures. Refer Zone to Win, Geoffrey Moore.
Work your contingency: Get your numbers to project an accurate contingency and fight for it.
Keep the future work visible: Visibly speak about the future work so that it shows as a commitment against your name.
Reflections
When the last contingency hit, where did the people come from?
What is still a slide that was supposed to exist by now?
