Bird in the hand...

I don't think there has been a more important time than now to truly appreciate the saying "bird in the hand is worth two in the bush".
With the current "financial crisis" (as everyone is labelling it) more and more clients are delaying projects. They aren't cancelling them they are delaying them. Which you would think is great news that at least they are delaying it rather than cancelling it, but that presents different challenges.
If the project was cancelled you would remove it from your pipeline and move on. Since it has been delayed it still stays in the pipeline as you need to have some sort of visibility across it, but you don't know when it will come back. Which means you can't plan for it.
So do you hold out and hope for the best or do you assume that the "slow down" will take a lot longer to turn around and manage the business that way???

With all these factors the way you price and compete is very important. Do you go in aggressively to sure up the business only to reduce the potential value you provide or do you stick to the "value" sell and position the cost appropriately, not necessarily sure up the business and take the risk?
It is a dilemma that's for sure. I think you take the most likely deal in the quickest time frame.

So my feeling is that in this climate (and probably other climates) you take the deal on the table based on what you know today and not what you "hope" will happen tomorrow. If other projects you have "sold" in eventually come in then deal with that. Don't hold out the delivery team for the "delayed" projects - they may never come.

I heard a great saying on the weekend from one of the Bourne movies which I think is very relevant in today's climate.
"Hope for the best. Plan for the worst"

Something that is imperative to do in this current climate, albeit difficult