Why “On-Time” Matters More Than “On-Budget” in Project Success

When asked what they expect from their digital agencies and consultancies, senior leaders often give a standard response:

“I need them to be on-time and on-budget.”

These two metrics are widely considered the gold standard for evaluating large projects. Even the U.S. White House, in the second paragraph of its “Building a Better America” initiative, promises to “get the job done on task, on time, and on budget.”

But while time and cost have been historically linked, only one of them truly influences how stakeholders perceive project success—and it's not the one you’d expect.

What the Data Says About Project Success

At Digital Clarity Group, we collect Voice of Customer (VOC) feedback from thousands of enterprise clients annually, measuring their satisfaction with digital agencies and consultancies. This data fuels the VOCalis Score, a 0–100 customer satisfaction metric derived from 40 data points of real feedback.

Last week, while updating our 2021 benchmarks, we ran a correlation analysis between individual data points and both NPS and VOCalis scores to uncover trends. Unsurprisingly, most factors—such as expectation management and communication effectiveness—had a moderate to strong correlation with customer satisfaction (r = 0.5 to 0.8).

But when we examined on-time vs. on-budget delivery, we found something shocking:

• On-time delivery had one of the strongest correlations with NPS (r = 0.76).

• On-budget delivery had almost no correlation with NPS (r = 0.21).

This means that, despite being historically coupled, adhering to a budget has virtually no impact on whether a client would recommend an agency or continue working with them.

Why On-Time Matters More Than On-Budget

The implications are clear:

• If a project runs over budget but meets deadlines, clients are still likely to be satisfied and continue working with the agency.

• If a project stays within budget but misses deadlines, clients are far less likely to be satisfied and may not return for future work.

The takeaway? Meeting deadlines drives client satisfaction and loyalty—sticking to budgets does not.

This isn’t to say that budgets don’t matter. Of course, agencies and consultancies should manage costs responsibly. But Procurement Managers, engagement leaders, and agency executives should reconsider how they weigh budget adherence in performance reviews and renewal decisions.

What This Means for Agencies & Clients

• For Procurement & Stakeholders:
  Stop weighing budget adherence as a primary factor in vendor evaluations. Instead, focus on on-time delivery, value creation, and execution quality.

• For Agencies & Consultancies:
  If you overrun a budget but deliver on time and with high value, don’t lose sleep over it—your clients likely won’t either. Instead, ensure flawless execution and deadline discipline to retain and grow key accounts.

Final Thought

“On-time and on-budget” may sound like a balanced metric, but the data shows only one truly impacts customer satisfaction and loyalty. Moving forward, agencies and clients alike should untangle these two metrics—because only one really matters in the end.