Project Management · Module 1 · Week 3 Video Script
Module 1 · Project Pursuit · Week 3 — Production
A single production-ready script covering Week 3's video content — timecode, on-screen direction, and word-for-word narration, tied to the Pursuit Toolkit.
For the video production team · not learner-facing · 1 script, ~9:30 totalVideo, single take
| Time | On-screen | Narration (VO) |
|---|---|---|
| 0:00–0:25 | Two Vantagepoint-style opportunity cards, side by side, both showing "Est. Net Revenue: $900,000 · Win Probability: 60%." Identical. | Look at these two opportunities. Same fields, same format, same numbers. One of them was built from the scope and an honest read of the odds. The other was a number somebody felt good about on a Friday. Can you tell which is which? |
| 0:25–0:55 | Cards fade to identical grey. Text: "The screen can't tell them apart. The firm still has to live with the difference." | You can't — and neither can Vantagepoint. Both numbers roll into the same weighted backlog, and the firm makes the same staffing and hiring decisions on each. A sloppy estimate doesn't announce itself. It just quietly distorts every decision downstream. |
| 0:55–1:25 | Title card: "From Guess to Forecast." Bridge line from last week appears faintly beneath it. | Last week's Go/No-Go decided a pursuit was worth the bet. This week we sharpen the three numbers that bet depends on: revenue, effort, and win probability — and the discipline of entering them so the firm can actually trust them. |
| 1:25–2:15 | Split graphic: "Top-down" (a fee number shrinking) vs. "Bottom-up" (phases and tasks stacking up into a number). | Start with revenue — and log the net, not the gross. Strip out subconsultant fees and reimbursables first; they pass through us, they're not ours to measure against. There are two honest ways to reach the net number. Top-down: start from the likely total fee — comparable projects, the client's budget signals, the RFP's range — then subtract the pass-throughs. Bottom-up: build it from the scope itself, phase by phase, task by task, at the rates those people bill. |
| 2:15–3:00 | A worked example builds on screen: "Top-down: $760,000. Bottom-up: $640,000. Gap: ~19%." | Here's what that actually looks like on a real lead. Top-down says roughly seven hundred sixty thousand. Bottom-up, built from the scope, says six hundred forty thousand. That's about a nineteen percent gap — too big to shrug off. Somewhere in there is a phase you under-scoped, or a comparable that doesn't really compare. |
| 3:00–3:35 | The two numbers converge with a check mark when close, or split apart with a question mark when far apart. | The discipline is checking one against the other. When they agree, you've got a defensible number. When they don't, you've found the assumption worth questioning before you log anything. That gap is information, not noise. |
| 3:35–4:25 | Five phase blocks build left to right: "Kickoff," "Analysis," "Design," "QA/Review," "Coordination" — the last two highlighted in amber. | Effort is the other side of the same coin — what the work will actually take, in hours, by phase and by role. Two things reliably go wrong here, and both are predictable. We forget the unglamorous phases — coordination, QA, revisions. And we assume senior staff will spend less time than they actually will. The hours we forget are exactly the ones that turn a profitable project into a thin one. |
| 4:25–4:55 | Text: "35 hours — the average technical lead spent on a single proposal in 2024." A small clock icon ticks. | There's a second effort number worth naming: the cost of pursuing itself. In 2024 the average technical lead spent about 35 hours on one proposal. That's real, billable time spent chasing the work, before you've won anything — it belongs in how hard you decide to pursue. |
| 4:55–5:15 | Transition card: "The number people most want to round up." | Now the number everyone's tempted to be generous with: win probability. |
| 5:15–6:10 | Four items build into a checklist: "Relationship," "Position," "Competition," "Capture." Each gets a one-line prompt as it appears. | It's a forecast, not a pep talk — the firm multiplies your percentage straight into the backlog. Anchor it to four things, not enthusiasm. Do we have a real, current relationship, or a logo we once worked for? Did we hear about this early, help shape the RFP, hold the incumbency? Do we know exactly who we're up against, and how we're different? And is there a capture plan we've actually executed, or are we starting cold? |
| 6:10–6:45 | Text overlay, large: "Would you bet your own money at those odds?" | Here's the gut check I want you to run on every number: would you bet your own money at those odds? If a seventy percent feels like something you'd hedge, it isn't a seventy. Calibrate down until it's a number you'd defend out loud — because next week, live, you will. |
| 6:45–7:45 | Split screen: "Protects the forecast" (green checklist) vs. "Poisons the forecast" (red checklist), both short and specific. A single example plays out under each: a stale 70% left untouched for two months vs. an updated record the week a competitor drops out. | One more thing before you log anything: a great estimate in your head helps no one. The firm forecasts on what's actually entered — and kept current. Net revenue from the scope, a win probability you'd bet on, updating the record when reality changes: that protects the forecast. Gross logged as net, probabilities rounded up to look committed, a seventy percent left untouched for two months after a competitor drops out: that poisons it. None of these look dramatic on one record. Summed across hundreds of pursuits, they're the whole difference between a backlog the firm can staff against and one that quietly lies to it. |
| 7:45–8:30 | On-screen checklist: "Build the estimate. Reconcile top-down vs bottom-up. Calibrate the odds. Defend the number." | Open the Toolkit now and build the estimate yourself, on the lead we've sent with this module. Reconcile your top-down and bottom-up revenue. Estimate the effort, phase by phase. And calibrate a win probability you'd actually defend. |
| 8:30–9:05 | Companion icon pulses: "Open the Pursuit Toolkit, loaded with the sanitized lead." | This is the same lead we'll carry into the live capstone next module, so build it like it matters — because it does. |
| 9:05–9:30 | WSE logo lockup, AEC LEAD / Zweig Group co-brand. | See you next week, live — where we put the whole pursuit together. |