Twelve million euros, external and internal. Only the smaller half had an invoice. The larger one happened anyway, it just never appeared in any decision.
A board approves what has an invoice. External project costs have an invoice, so they are checked, negotiated, approved. Internal effort has no invoice. It shows up in no approval template, because the people are „already there“. And that is exactly why the most expensive part of a program stays invisible.
Let us work it through for a program over seven years. On the side with an invoice are my external program leadership, a delivery partner, some development, the running operation and the translations. Together around 5.3 million. Checked, negotiated, approved. On the other side is the effort for which no invoice ever came. The internal country teams across 70 entities alone add up, over the runtime, to around 5.6 million. Add the regional core team at just under a million, the central shared services, internal legal work and individual specialists. In sum around 7.1 million that fell internally and appeared nowhere as cost. Together that is 12.4 million. Not even half of it had an invoice.
checked, approved
never in an approval
This is not an accounting question. It becomes concrete whenever it is about resources. Whoever does not plan the internal effort has an organization in which everyone is already under load, and from above it sounds like the usual complaining, met with further cuts. When I then come in from the side, of all things with a compliance program no one ordered, the change has to be prepared. I turned up at every single plant management: the reference to the board decision, the background, the explanation of what participation concretely means. In 95 percent of cases that carried. The remaining five fell in line after serious conversations, without an escalation upward being necessary.
Why the invisible part is the more important one
One could say: internal time costs nothing extra, why show it? Because the internal resources are the ones that really matter. Whoever does not plan them lets the externals tinker in the end, while internally no one is really involved, because internally no one has time. And when the externals are done and leave, the knowledge is gone with them. What remains is a system no one in the house can really assess.
A board that wants to make an investment decision honestly should therefore demand that the internal effort be estimated and shown. Precisely also when no one has to approve it. Otherwise it decides on half the number and is surprised later by the whole one.
The test question for your next approval: does an estimate of the internal effort stand next to every external number? If it is missing, you are deciding on half the bill.
The most expensive part of a program is the one no one approves. Because it stands in no approval, it is taken to be free. It is only invisible, not free of charge.