In industrial project business, expensive mistakes are not always made on the construction site or in the workshop. Sometimes they are made much earlier, when an offer is approved or an investment is authorised. A quantity is assumed to be correct, an interface is left unclear, or two departments use the same word to describe different scopes of work. By the time the problem appears in a monthly report, the opportunity to correct it cheaply may already have passed.

Over more than 30 years in industrial machinery and plant engineering, I learned that another lengthy report is rarely the answer. What can make a difference is a short, thoroughly prepared discussion with the people who understand the technical and commercial consequences. In several settings, approximately two hours proved a useful amount of time. I call this the two-hour rule, but the name is less important than what actually happened in practice.

The quantity review: are we estimating the same project?

One recurring challenge in preparing industrial offers is the quantity structure: steel tonnage, metres of cable, engineering hours, installation work and other elements that form the basis of an estimate. The numbers may look precise. Yet their reliability depends on assumptions about the work that will actually be performed.

In our practice, we brought together specialists from the relevant functions to discuss the quantity structure before the commercial commitment was finalised. Engineering explained the technical scope and unresolved alternatives. Estimating examined how these translated into costs. Procurement, manufacturing, installation and other involved functions challenged assumptions from their own experience. The question was not whether everyone had completed their spreadsheet. It was whether everyone was talking about the same project.

A focused discussion could uncover missing activities, inconsistent quantities or interfaces that had been interpreted differently. These are not matters that can be resolved by adding another decimal place to a calculation. They require people to explain what they mean, ask uncomfortable questions and listen to colleagues with different expertise.

In the industrial environment where this practice became established, I observed deviations in quantity structures of around 20 per cent before systematic reviews and below 3 per cent afterwards. These are observations from my professional context, not the results of a controlled study or a promise that every organisation will achieve the same improvement. The practical lesson was clear: questioning assumptions early could materially improve the basis of an estimate.

We did not need a day-long conference to achieve that. We needed preparation, the right people and the willingness to address the economically important questions rather than work mechanically through every line of a document.

Risk analysis: a register does not prevent a failure

A second application concerned Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA). Risk lists are easy to produce. They can contain descriptions, rankings and colours, yet still leave the organisation uncertain about what to do next.

In a focused FMEA discussion, the useful questions are more concrete: What could fail? What would be the consequence for the project? Which assumptions are vulnerable? What can still be changed? And who will take responsibility for the next step?

A two-hour session cannot resolve every technical uncertainty. That was never the point. It can, however, concentrate attention on the significant failure possibilities, identify preventive action and establish who must investigate unresolved issues. Sometimes the most valuable outcome is a clearly assigned question that must be answered before the next decision.

This distinction matters. Recognising a risk is not the same as reducing it. A risk register can document a concern long after the moment when a practical intervention would have been easiest. A conversation held before a commitment offers a better chance of changing the outcome.

A €100 million investment: two hours before execution

A third experience involved a major investment of approximately €100 million. A structured discussion lasting about two hours helped bring assumptions, risks and responsibilities into the open before the decision moved into execution. The discussion was documented and its record passed to the people responsible for implementation.

I would not claim that two hours settled every question surrounding an investment of that size, nor that the meeting alone generated a measurable financial return. The important point was that relevant expertise was brought together while the decision could still be clarified. The people responsible for subsequent execution received more than an approval: they received a record of the assumptions and issues behind it.

That continuity is easy to underestimate. In a complex industrial organisation, the people who prepare an offer or investment decision are not always the same people who must carry it out. If the underlying assumptions are not communicated, the project team may inherit a number without knowing the reasoning behind it. A concise, useful record can prevent this loss of context.

What made these conversations useful?

Looking back at these different experiences, I would emphasise four practical points.

First, the work happened before the meeting. Participants needed the relevant quantities, documents, assumptions and unresolved questions in advance. Without preparation, a short meeting simply becomes a hurried meeting.

Second, the participants were selected for their knowledge, not merely their position in the hierarchy. An engineer who understands a difficult interface may be more useful to a specific discussion than a manager who can only report that the department is on schedule. Decision authority still matters, but it must be connected to expertise.

Third, the discussion concentrated on the issues that could change the economic outcome. A status meeting can report a hundred items without resolving the one assumption that threatens the margin. A decision-oriented conversation asks which unresolved matter really deserves attention now.

Fourth, the result had to survive the meeting. An agreed assumption, a decision, or an open issue with an owner and a deadline needed to be recorded and transferred to the people who would act on it. Otherwise even an excellent conversation would soon be forgotten.

These are lessons from practice, not a universal checklist. Some issues take less than two hours; others demand further analysis and additional meetings. Safety assessments, formal approvals and technical verification must never be compressed merely to satisfy a memorable time limit.

Why this matters beyond the meeting room

Industrial projects bring together specialists whose knowledge is necessarily incomplete outside their own field. Engineering understands technical feasibility. Procurement understands supplier conditions. Installation teams understand site realities. Estimating translates assumptions into costs. Sales and commercial management understand customer commitments and contractual consequences. Each function may be right about its own piece while the total commitment remains inconsistent.

The challenge is therefore not to eliminate disagreement. It is to make disagreement productive before the organisation loses its options. A missing activity found before an offer can still be priced or clarified with the customer. The same omission discovered during execution may result in an unexpected cost or a disputed change. Timing changes the economics of the problem.

This is also why I have never regarded calculation as a purely numerical exercise. Calculation is communication. A spreadsheet can calculate the result of an assumption, but it cannot establish whether everyone involved understands that assumption in the same way.

After a contract is awarded, the same discipline should continue. The question is not only why the budget has changed, but what the remaining work is likely to cost and what can still be influenced. Reports explain what has happened; timely conversations help people decide what to do next.

The two-hour rule does not mean adding a new meeting to every calendar. Used indiscriminately, it would become exactly the bureaucracy it is intended to avoid. Its value lies in choosing the moments when an early, prepared exchange can prevent an expensive misunderstanding.

Better decisions do not necessarily require more meetings. Sometimes they require fewer presentations, better questions and two hours in which the right people actually talk to one another.

_{About the author}

_{Carsten Knappe-Finger is a Graduate in Business Administration (Dipl.-Betriebswirt), Six Sigma Black Belt and practitioner-author with more than 30 years of experience in industrial machinery and plant engineering. He held leading positions in commercial management, cost estimating and business excellence. His writing draws on practical experience in project economics, risk management and cross-functional decision-making.}