20.1. The New Schedule, the New Budget

The silence in the conference room told me we had pulled off a coup. I do not think anyone, especially Ralph, had expected the scenario I had just presented.

"Could you explain that one more time?" he asked in a puzzled voice. "I still don't believe we can have the first run of WindSailors ready by April 15, and it's going to cost us less money."

I was quick to qualify his statement. "That's right, Ralph, but as you can see," here I gestured to the dependency chart on the wall, "we have decreased the scope of the project a little. We won't be paving the new employee parking lot this season. The same is true for the new public parking lot and access road, which will have to be approved by the city council. We also won't have the entire assignment finished by the fifteenth of April. The new fencing between us and Lake Hyler won't be done until our original date in June, and the same goes for the new retail outlet." I looked back at Ralph. "We shortened up the delivery of part of the project—the production facilities—but not all of the other components will be ready by then."

This didn't seem to concern Ralph, which is what I expected, and Carrie was pleased as well. Stu said, "You didn't really answer Ralph's question, Will. Why is this new plan costing less?"

"Two reasons," I told him as if I had understood this all my life. "The first, and largest, has to do with the decreased scope. We have to speed up the construction, machine installation, ...

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