{"id":679,"date":"2005-04-25T08:34:53","date_gmt":"2005-04-25T15:34:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp\/2005\/04\/the_wonderful_world_of_budget\/"},"modified":"2005-04-25T08:34:53","modified_gmt":"2005-04-25T15:34:53","slug":"the_wonderful_world_of_budget","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/main\/the_wonderful_world_of_budget.php","title":{"rendered":"The wonderful world of budget games"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I was just revisiting Chris Argyris&#8217; classic (and strangely expensive) book from 1990 on <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/exec\/obidos\/redirect?tag=bolzcenter-20&amp;creative=9325&amp;camp=1789&amp;link_code=as2&amp;path=ASIN\/0205123384\"><i>Overcoming Organizational Defenses<\/i><\/a>, and rediscovered his list of 12 budget games managers and politicians play when trying to get a project passed through the system. See how many look familiar to your organization or to yourself (be honest):<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><i>Foot in the door<\/i><br \/>\nSell a new program modestly. Conceal its real magnitude.<\/p>\n<li><i>Hidden ball<\/i><br \/>\nConceal a politically unattractive program within an attractive one.<\/p>\n<li><i>Divide and conquer<\/i><br \/>\nSeek approval of a budget request from more than one supervisor.<\/p>\n<li><i>Distraction<\/i><br \/>\nBase a specific request on the premise that an overall program has been approved when this is not in fact the case.<\/p>\n<li><i>It&#8217;s free<\/i><br \/>\nArgue that someone else will pay for the project so the organization might as well approve it.<\/p>\n<li><i>Razzle-dazzle<\/i><br \/>\nSupport the request with voluminous data, but arranged in such a way that their significance is not clear.<\/p>\n<li><i>Delayed buck<\/i><br \/>\nSubmit the data late, arguing that the budget guidelines required so much detailed calculation that the job could not be done on time.<\/p>\n<li><i>Our program is priceless<\/i><br \/>\nIt is difficult to argue against defense or human life.<\/p>\n<li><i>It can&#8217;t be measured<\/i><br \/>\nThe real benefit is subjective.<\/p>\n<li><i>Tomorrow and tomorrow<\/i><br \/>\nIf there are no results today, promise some in the future.<\/p>\n<li><i>Stretching things<\/i><br \/>\nThe real skill is not simply to promise something that is difficult to prove; promise something that is impossible to disprove.<\/p>\n<li><i>Both ends against the middle<\/i><br \/>\nPlay competing committees against each other.\n<\/ul>\n<p>Let the games begin!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I was just revisiting Chris Argyris&#8217; classic (and strangely expensive) book from 1990 on Overcoming Organizational Defenses, and rediscovered his list of 12 budget games managers and politicians play when trying to get a project passed through the system. See how many look familiar to your organization or to yourself (be honest): Foot in the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-679","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-main","7":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=679"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=679"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=679"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=679"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}