> "I need the time anyway. Provide it in a spreadsheet by end of day." I'd offer a time that's 4-5x as long as a reasonable ballpark. If they take that time, i

> "I need the time anyway. Provide it in a spreadsheet by end of day." I'd offer a time that's 4-5x as long as a reasonable ballpark. If they take that time, it gives you some slack. If they balk at it, you can explain that the estimate takes into account all of the unknown variables, and that if they'd like to shorten the time, they'll need to invest a little bit of time into discovery to get a breakdown of the timeline. Once managers start being faced with the real costs of their decisions, they start to be reasonable. But you have to do this in a calm and reasonable manner, not passive aggressively. If you do it just to get back at a manager, it will backfire on you.