The title "Opinion of Probable Development Cost" is derieved from the term Opinion of Probable Construction Cost (OPCC). I was drawn to this wording as it does a better job of conveying uncertainty versus just "estimates". There are two qualifiers here Opinion & Probable which convey and reiterate inherent uncertainty.
Civil engineers use OPCC to provide cost estimates for large Civil Engineering projects (e.g. bridges, dams, etc). These estimates are generated early in the project inception stage. These numbers seem to be sticky and publicizing it causes all future estimates to always be compared to the original regardless of how early in the process it was generated.
There are many parallels between Civil Engineers and Software Engineers when it comes to estimating costs and overall project delays.
Common themes
| Civil Engineering | Software Engineering |
| Underestimating the complexity | |
Chicken-n-egg problem
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| Capabilities of contractors unknown (machinery, expertise, etc) | Skills gap unknown |