Are Funds Approved and Set Aside For a Purchase of Software or Cloud Services?

It is important before spending a lot of time on the project to meet with your CFO and ask a lot of questions about project funding approval. The only activity you should be doing before discussing funding approval is determining if check signers have any pain points. Giva has written a very informative white paper entitled: Do Senior Leaders Have Pain Points? - IT Help Desk & Customer Service Software

There is a "new normal" in today's business environment that dictates careful analysis and justification when spending money for software purchases. Money will be a big hurdle to overcome. If your CFO will not give you iron clad assurance that money is approved and set aside, then you are just wasting your time. It is extremely important to ask questions, and poke and prod in this area in the very early stages of the project. You should be doing this before wasting any of your valuable time engaging with vendors or in any other activities.