When should a project in Berne stop, despite the investment already made?
In Berne's federal administration, public health, telecommunications and precision industry, stopping a project can carry as much responsibility as continuing it. For SHR — Swiss Human Resources' “Management complexe” programme, the question is specific: how can managers reassess continuation without turning past investment into an obligation to succeed?
What the literature establishes
Barry M. Staw (1976, Organizational Behavior and Human Performance) showed experimentally that responsibility for an initial decision can encourage the commitment of additional resources after negative feedback. This finding illuminates escalation of commitment: defending a project can also serve to defend one's own judgement. It does not mean that all persistence after a setback is irrational.
When past expenditure becomes an argument
Hal R. Arkes and Catherine Blumer (1985, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes) documented the sunk cost effect: an earlier investment of money, effort or time can increase the tendency to continue. Their work highlights, in particular, the desire not to appear wasteful. The decision may then centre on justifying the past rather than on the future consequences of the available options.
The premature conclusion
One might conclude that projects should stop as soon as results disappoint, or that the decision should always be assigned to someone outside the project. These studies do not establish the general superiority of either rule. A sunk cost must be distinguished from an avoidable future consequence: exit costs, service continuity and contractual obligations remain relevant to the decision. (our executive and employee training programmes)
What the evidence does not settle
These classic studies identify decision-making tendencies but provide no universal stopping threshold for a public programme or an industrial development project. The situations studied do not capture all the regulatory, technical and political dependencies of a project in Berne. A project review that merely records a budget overrun is therefore insufficient: it must compare future options and their uncertainties.
A practical check in Berne
As part of the “Management complexe” programme, SHR can propose a prospective exercise: for four weeks, document every decision to continue a selected project in a Berne-based organisation, whether it concerns a federal service, a public health initiative, a telecommunications network or a precision production line. The decision record should compare continuation, redirection and termination, separating sunk expenditure, future costs, expected benefits and continuity obligations. The proposed measure is the proportion of decisions reviewed for which this written comparison exists before the decision, verifiable through dated records and minutes. This indicator measures the traceability of the reasoning, not the correctness of the decision or the savings achieved. To go further: explore the Complex Management training in Bern in the canton of Bern, or browse our executive and employee training programmes in Switzerland.
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