Learn Hardcore Finnish: Esimies kysyi, mikä prioriteetti meillä olisi projektissa, jos kaikki ei ehdi valmiiksi sovittuun määräaikaan mennessä. - The supervisor asked what priority we would have in the project if not everything is finished by the agreed deadline.

mikä is used when you are identifying or choosing which one from a set of clearly separate options, often with a singular countable noun.
- Mikä prioriteetti meillä olisi? ≈ What (which) priority would we have?
The noun prioriteetti is in the nominative because it is a predicate, linked to an implied verb olla:
- (Se) olisi mikä prioriteetti — it would be what priority.
mitä prioriteettia (partitive) would sound like you’re asking about the kind/degree of priority rather than cleanly identifying “which priority”, and here that’s not what is needed. It would be odd in this context.

So mikä + nominative is the natural way to ask “what priority” in this sentence.

Why do we say meillä olisi to mean “we would have”? Why not just a verb “to have”?

Finnish does not have a separate verb to have like English. Instead, it uses a structure:

[adessive] + olla = “[X] has / would have”

minulla on kirja = I have a book (literally: on me is a book)
meillä olisi prioriteetti = we would have a priority (literally: on us would be a priority)

In your sentence:

meillä = “on us / for us” (adessive plural of me “we”)
olisi = conditional of olla “to be”

So mikä prioriteetti meillä olisi literally means “what priority would there be for us”, i.e. “what would our priority be”.

You could also say mikä olisi meidän prioriteettimme, but meillä olisi is the most typical, neutral way to express possession.

Why is olisi in the conditional, instead of simple on?

olisi is the conditional form of olla (“would be”). It is used because the sentence is talking about a hypothetical situation introduced by jos “if”:

… mikä prioriteetti meillä olisi projektissa, jos…
“…what the priority would be in the project, if…”

So:

mikä prioriteetti meillä on = what priority do we have (real, current situation)
mikä prioriteetti meillä olisi, jos… = what priority would we have, if… (hypothetical, depends on a condition)

The -isi- marker in olisi is the standard way to form the conditional in Finnish:

olla → olisi (would be)
tehdä → tekisi (would do)
saada → saisi (would get)

What exactly does ehdi mean here, and why isn’t it ehtii?

The verb is ehtiä, which usually means:

to have time (to do something),
to make it (somewhere / in time),
to manage to be completed in time.

In the sentence:
jos kaikki ei ehdi valmiiksi… ≈ if everything doesn’t manage to be finished (in time)…

About the form:

Affirmative 3rd person singular present: hän ehtii = he/she/it has time / makes it
In the negative, Finnish uses a special connegative form of the main verb, and the personal information is carried by ei:
- kaikki ehtii = everything makes it
- kaikki ei ehdi = everything does not make it

So ehdi is the negative 3rd person singular present of ehtiä. That’s why you see ei ehdi, not ei ehtii.

Even though English uses will for the future, Finnish can use simple present (ei ehdi) to refer to a future situation, especially in jos “if” clauses.

Why is it kaikki ei ehdi (singular) and not kaikki eivät ehdi (plural)?

The word kaikki can mean either:

everything (neuter, mass-like, singular), or
everyone, all (people) (plural).

Agreement follows the meaning:

Kaikki ei ehdi valmiiksi.
→ Not everything will be finished in time.
Here kaikki = “everything”, so the verb is singular (ei ehdi).
Kaikki eivät ehdi paikalle.
→ Not everyone will make it there.
Here kaikki = “all (people)”, so the verb is plural (eivät ehdi).

In your sentence, kaikki obviously refers to all the tasks/work/things in the project, i.e. everything, so the singular ei ehdi is correct and natural.

What does valmiiksi mean exactly, and why that -ksi ending?

valmiiksi comes from the adjective valmis = ready, finished.

The ending -ksi is the translative case, which often expresses a change of state or “into/as something”.

So:

tulla valmiiksi = to become ready / be finished
tehdä työ valmiiksi = to finish the work (make it ready)

In your sentence:

jos kaikki ei ehdi valmiiksi…
“if everything doesn’t manage to get to a ready state / finished…”

So valmiiksi literally means “into readiness”, and together with ehtiä it describes reaching that finished state in time.

How does sovittuun määräaikaan work grammatically?

Breakdown:

määräaika = deadline
- määrä = amount, limit
- aika = time
määräaikaan is illative singular (“into / by / to the deadline”). The illative often marks a target in time:
- kello viiteen = until / by five o’clock
- ensi viikkoon = until / by next week
sovittuun is from the verb sopia = to agree (on).
- Past participle: sovittu = agreed (on)
- Put into the same case (illative) to match määräaikaan → sovittuun.

In Finnish, adjectives (and participles used as adjectives) agree in case with the noun they modify:

uusi talo → uuteen taloon (into the new house)
sovittu määräaika → sovittuun määräaikaan (to/by the agreed deadline)

So sovittuun määräaikaan literally means to/by the agreed deadline.

What is mennessä doing here? Is it a tense form?

mennessä in määräaikaan mennessä is:

the 2nd infinitive inessive of mennä (to go), and
in this fixed construction it works almost like a postposition meaning by (the time something is reached).

The pattern is:

[time-expression in illative] + mennessä = “by [time]”

Examples:

kello viiteen mennessä = by five o’clock
ensi viikkoon mennessä = by next week
vuoteen 2030 mennessä = by the year 2030

So:

sovittuun määräaikaan mennessä
≈ by the agreed deadline (by the time the deadline is reached)

It’s a very common way to say “by [a certain time]” in Finnish.

Why is the if-clause jos kaikki ei ehdi in the present, not in the conditional (jos kaikki ei ehtisi)?

In standard Finnish, the usual pattern for real or likely hypothetical situations is:

if-clause: jos
- indicative (present or past)
main clause: conditional

So:

Jos kaikki ei ehdi valmiiksi, mikä prioriteetti meillä olisi?
= If not everything is finished in time, what priority would we have?

Using conditional in the if-clause (jos kaikki ei ehtisi) tends to sound:

more literary or formal, and/or
more like a less realistic or counterfactual scenario.

For everyday Finnish about a possible future situation, jos kaikki ei ehdi (present) + olisi (conditional) is the natural combination. Note that Finnish often uses present tense for future time in such clauses.

What does projektissa express here, and why the -ssa ending?

projekti = project
projektissa = in the project (inessive case: -ssa / -ssä)

The inessive case often expresses being inside something, physically or metaphorically:

talossa = in the house
kokouksessa = in the meeting
projektissa = within the project / in the context of the project

In the sentence:

mikä prioriteetti meillä olisi projektissa…

projektissa restricts the question to this particular project context:

“what priority we would have in the project” (i.e. within this project’s work and tasks),
not in some general or company-wide sense.

You could move it a bit (mikä prioriteetti projektissa meillä olisi), but the meaning stays essentially the same; the -ssa ending is what really carries the “in” meaning.