Why Projects Fall Apart After Approval and How to Fix It with Early Resource Alignment

Let me tell you about a project that looked perfect on paper. 

The business case had been polished to perfection. Budget? Approved. Timeline? Locked. Executive sponsors? Fully on board. 

But when the project manager showed up at the delivery team's weekly sync to start assigning tasks, confusion filled the room.

"We’re supposed to work on what? Starting when?" 

No one had heard of the project. 
No one had been consulted. 
No one had the capacity. 

The kickoff turned into chaos. The PM spent the next two weeks negotiating availability and a few weeks more waiting for new resources to be hired. Time that could have been spent managing execution. Deadlines were missed before work even began.

This Isn’t a Resource Problem. It’s a Planning Problem.

Too often, resource planning is treated as something that happens after the ink is dry on the business case. Like the people required to do the work will magically appear once the strategy is set. 

But here’s what I’ve learned: 

Execution problems usually start long before execution begins. 

The root of the issue? The delivery teams weren’t involved when the project was scoped. No one asked if they had the bandwidth. No one confirmed if the skills were a fit. No one flagged overlapping initiatives. 

So the plan was approved. But the people required to bring it to life weren’t ready—because they were never part of the conversation.

Why This Happens

I’ve seen this scenario unfold more times than I can count, especially in organizations where the PMO is trying to move quickly and show strategic alignment. 

What usually happens is this: a business case gets built, often with input from sponsors and finance, and it ticks all the right boxes, strategic goals, ROI, even a rough budget. But the delivery teams? They’re looped in after the fact, if at all. 

No one checks whether the people needed to deliver the work are already committed to other projects. No one asks whether onboarding another initiative will overload the same resources that are already running hot. 

It’s not bad intent. It’s just a blind spot. And the fallout is always the same: project delays, scrambling for resources, frustrated delivery leads, and PMs trying to triage a mess that could have been prevented with one earlier conversation.

What to Do Instead: Shift Resourcing Left 

Let me offer a more relatable path forward, one that doesn’t require a massive overhaul. 

I’ve found that when PMOs simply begin inviting delivery leads into the business case conversations, something shifts. The conversation goes from, "Should we do this project?" to, "Can we do this project now and what will it take?" 

Those conversations don’t need to be formal steering committees. Sometimes it’s just a 30-minute sync to sanity-check availability and capacity. 

But those moments matter. Because once you hear a delivery manager say, "We’re already running two other major efforts this quarter," you realize that the business case might be right but the timing might not be. 

That’s the kind of foresight that separates fire drills from actual planning.

Start with Conversations, Not Spreadsheets