Business English for Project Management & Budgets

Hi there and welcome back to engVid. My name

is Benjamin. Today's lesson is primarily aimed

at those of you using English for business,

particularly those of you who have some hand

in project management and keeping control of the finances, the budgets. So let's plow

straight on in. Just a quick overview. We're

going to be looking at possible problems when

things go wrong, when things are going well,

and then looking at some top tips, as in advice

you can give others. So things that might

go wrong. Well, if we're looking after a pot

of money and no attention has been paid to the

detail, then maybe some's gone here, some's

gone there, some's gone there, and then all of a sudden, oh, there's no money left. A

lack, that means not enough attention to detail

in the planning. So that can refer to more

things other than the budget, the project. Was

it planned in enough detail? Now, if things

fall behind, the project is moving too slowly,

then we would say that it is behind schedule.

Behind schedule. So we're on Monday, but the

work, we're still doing Friday's work. We're

behind schedule. And if you become behind schedule, then you're going to need to play

or have to play catch-up. So if we've got a race

and my friend is ahead of me, then I have to try

and catch him up. If we're playing catch-up

at work, then we're meant to have done this,

so very quickly we have to reach this level. We

have to catch up. If you are ill, then when you

come back from being ill, you need to catch up on

all your emails and all the work you need to do.

Now, I have created a lesson on sort of sailing,

boat idioms, etc. So this one is in there. But if

you missed the boat, then you're too late. Maybe

you're applying for a job and the deadline is

nine o'clock. And if you don't finish your

application by nine o'clock, you've missed the

boat, or more formally, to miss the deadline.

Often, idioms can be used in a more sort of

social and informal way where the accurate

vocabulary to the point is often what's used

in business English. That's a generalization.

Other problems, if you run out of money,

it doesn't mean you're running away. No, it just

means the money has run away. You have run out,

there's no money left. Maybe that was caused

by an unrealistic budget. Could you practice

saying that with me? Unrealistic budget. And once again, unrealistic budget.

So, reality is, you know, the real world. If

something is realistic, then it's in line with

how the world is. I think realistically, it's

looking like it might snow tomorrow. If I have

unrealistic expectations of the weather, I might

think it's going to be sunny. An unrealistic

budget is a plan for the money in the project that is not realistic.

Budget constraints. Constraints is like a tie

that holds you. So, it's like a limitation,

budget limitations. So, we can only spend this amount on burritos. Key consideration.

If you go over budget, then you spend too much,

maybe on the burrito. You go for the extra large

instead of the large. Yep. You're out of control. You can't help it. You're like,

I want the extra large, but the budget says you're only allowed the large.

We've got to pay attention to the detail, haven't

we? We don't want to be running out of money.

Yep. We need to have realistic budgets. If I

can't help getting an extra large burrito, then

I need to be more realistic with my budget. I make

it sound like I've got some real food problem.

Okay. Let's look at effective planning.

Effective planning, when we plan effectively,

we stay within budget. So, our plan is to spend

this amount, and maybe we spend less than that.

It doesn't happen to me very often, but I like the idea. To stay on track.

Track. Yep. Like the train track. So, if a project is on track, then we're going to be

meeting the deadline. The deadline's kind of at

the next stop. Choo-choo, choo-choo, choo-choo.

We're on track. We're going to get there. If your

budget is on track, then you're not spending too

much. Yep. You're staying on the straight and

the narrow. You're staying on the path. Yeah.

An accurate forecast. Yep. Forecast. What is

coming our way? What is coming forward? What's

coming from... What's, you know, the weather

forecast. What weather are we about to have?

An accurate forecast. An accurate prediction.

An accurate forecast of maybe the money that

is coming into the business. We're going to have this sale, this commission.

If you get that accurate, it will be easier to plan the budget.

Upfront planning, meaning planning in advance.

Plans are meant to be about what's meant to happen.

It's a very strange situation to have to do plans

for things you have already done. You don't want

to do that. You want to plan upfront, before.

To make the launch date. Launch. Rocket. If you

make the launch date, then the project is running

to time. Or, even better, ahead of schedule.

So, over here, we had behind schedule. Yeah,

you're all late and you're doing last week's work.

If you're ahead of schedule, you're like, "Woo,

I've done all of this work and now I'm going to

do next week's work." Okay, you still with me?

Good. Hope you are a subscriber, because that

helps me to make these videos. And let's have a

look at some key tips. This quote is often quoted

by Benjamin Franklin. "By failing to prepare, you

are preparing to fail." Sometimes shortened to

"fail to prepare", "prepare to fail". Well, it

sounds all rather negative. Let's avoid that,

shall we? By prioritizing tasks. Say it after

me. Prioritizing. I know it says prioritize.

Say "prioritizing". Good, in the continuous. So,

you have a to-do list. Yep, people normally have

long to-do lists. Prioritizing the tasks, the

things you need to do, is going, "Right, well,

that is more important than that." I often have

two columns on a piece of paper saying sort of

urgent and non-urgent. Or before I came here to Toronto, it was before Canada,

urgent, non-urgent. Different people do it in different ways.

To keep a tab on spending. Now, if you go into

a pub in the UK and say, "Can I start up a tab,

please?" It means that they just write down everything you spend, and then at the end,

you pay the bill. So, if you keep a tab on

spending, what you're doing is you're writing

it down. You're taking note as it happens. Allocate sufficient, again, difficult to

pronounce, sufficient resources. Adjective

meaning enough, and the verb here, allocate,

means that's going for this, that's for this,

that's for this. This is how much we're spending

on rent, this is how much we are spending on food,

this is how much we're spending on transport.

So, putting, you know, deciding to give enough

for each of the things. Here, resources,

allocating sufficient resources. Well, money

is a resource, time is a resource, manpower.

To make a contingency plan. I've written here that contingency means a backup plan,

plan B. So, this is plan A, but if it all goes

wrong, if it snows tomorrow and we can't do

anything like that, our contingency plan,

good formal English that, a contingency plan.

At my cousin's wedding, the father of the groom, that's the man getting married,

had a contingency plan in case there was a

huge flood, which seemed rather unlikely, but

you've got to think of all eventualities.

Shall I write that down for you? Eventualities,

that means anything that happens. Eventualities in the plural, eventualities.

We're going to check progress at every stage.

So, you can imagine this man was very detail

orientated as he prepared for his son's wedding,

and he was making sure that progress was being

made at every stage. Has this been done? Has this

been done? Can we have an update on this, please?

Yep, very, very detail orientated. Can be a bit of a headache. Now, I've just got a few

ways in which time, stay, and keep can be

used to talk about budgets, etc., and plans.

Time, you're not going to run out of time. So, we've had run out of money,

where there's no more money. It's the same idea.

The time goes, oh no, I'm leaving Canada tomorrow,

and I've run out of time, and I haven't done this, and I haven't done that.

Stay, I could, but it wouldn't be very popular.

Stay, you're managing to stay on track. You're

managing. Are you... If you manage... So, a manager handles things, yep, they organize,

control things. If you are managing, are you...

If you are managing, you're kind of surviving,

you're being able to do it. Are you being able to stay on track? Are you...

You're doing okay on track? Are you on progress?

Still going okay? You're going to meet the

deadline? Are you staying within the budget?

You're not going over budget, staying within

the budget. I don't think I've ever done that in my life, must learn. Keep,

keep to the budget. Yep, this is how much we're

spending, we keep to it. Keep to the launch date,

yep, getting everything ready for the big day,

and keeping costs down, yep, less spending.

I hope there's been some really useful vocab

for you in today's lesson. As a way of revising

the content, do go over to the engVid website

where you'll be able to do today's quiz. Thanks

for watching. Do share with someone who would

find this useful, and I'll see you in the next

video, just as long as you're subscribing so you know when it is out. Thanks.