Executive Producer Pro tip: Beware the Ballpark Estimate

There are few things that have bitten me in the ass as often and as regularly as ballparks. I aways see it coming and still get nailed. It's like laying landmines while you are racing on a circular racetrack. They sit there waiting to blow you up on the next lap.

The request is often innocent. They just want an idea of what a script/concept costs. Usually for budgeting reasons. And we always want to be involved early right? So what's the problem? The problem comes later. When the script changes even more but the ballpark budget doesn't. Now you have a helicopter script and a drone budget. There are a few ways to avoid this situation. Or at least mitigate the inherent conflict. First, I usually try to avoid giving a ballpark at all. I might lead with something like, "How much do we have?... It will cost that much. But I'm not promising that Helicopter shot." But sometimes they just have to have something and better it comes from us than from the ether. The most important thing you can do is work with your Client folks to make sure they understand the situation and have skin in the game. But it's always possible your estimate gets folded into a client deck with just the number and none of the background information. And sometimes there's nothing you can do about it. The best way to avoid this is to keep the ballpark informal. The more it looks like a real estimate the more likely it will be treated as such. Caveats in the notes are great but we know that no one reads those anyway. It definitely shouldn't be something in an official doc that looks like it could be signed. Sometimes I'll give a short written paragraph explaining the scope of the estimate and the limitations. That way someone might pause before copy and pasting it or at least remember the conversation you've had. AND HAVE THE CONVERSATION. Don't just tack it on to the end of an email to cover your own ass. Your focus should be to make this work not just to avoid blame. And covering your ass will do nothing to help the situation later. You'll still have to deal with it. So it's better to give your future self a break and head off a potential problem now. Half of a producer's job is to manage the numbers i.e. money, calendars, etc... The other half has to be to help those around you understand production and how to do it right. Unfortunately, education is not something our industry is good at. Both inside production as career building and outside as best practices. The upside is that we can have a voice but you have to consider it part of your job. More to come on that but it will have to wait for another post.