Kyle Wiebers

Decision by committee is every freelancers worst nightmare.  Many nights, I’ve woken up in a cold pale sweat dreaming about a group of stakeholders completely changing my initial vision.   Using the four techniques outlined below will help combat decision by committee and get rid of these nightmares for good.

Hold Separate Stakeholder Interviews

Separating stakeholders prevents initial decisions from being made with a domino effect.  This provides lots of help for you in the long run.  Let me give you an example how not separating stakeholders for interviews can be hurtful for you.

I once knew this print designer, let’s call him Phillip.  Well one day, Phillip decided to take on business with a company that had terrible politics throughout the office.  Phillip held design reviews for all of his work with a group of five key stakeholders.  Within this group of five, there was a strongly opinionated individual who “understood” design which the group would tend to follow in these sessions.  After these meetings Phillip would be working and then concerns would be raised privately by the other four stakeholders.  This left Phillip in the position to play office politician just to get his work done, which was not worth the final pay check.

Separating the stakeholders out would have proved beneficial to Phillip, even if only initially.  The extra time spent interviewing will be rewarded with a better understanding of company politics and build a relationship with all your stakeholders.

Define Vision

Doing this before the majority of work begins for an engagement will save you headaches in the future.  A clear vision statement should state the objectives, requirements and a timeframe for completion.  This will set clear expectations for you and the customer up front providing traceability for objectives to refer back to if problems with scope should arise.

Establish Yourself as the Expert

Establishing yourself as the expert in the situation is crucial for young freelancers.  When I first started, I was focused on customer service and the client always knew what’s best.  That’s a surefire way to get dominated in a business relationship.  It’s key to understand that a freelance engagement is a business relationship and should be treated as such.  Your client came to you because you provide expertise in a specific subject matter, be sure to be the expert they sought out.

There will be multiple scenarios in your freelancing career where a client will request that you do something to make them happy, but will reduce the quality or value of the end product.  A recent example of this for me is a client that asked me to double the size of their logo on their new web design to build brand identity. I handled this by thinking through the cost-benefits of the decision.  In this example, increasing the size of the logo would help them with building brand identity, but at the cost of reducing the amount of space to communicate services and having room for content or navigation.  Thinking through the costs for the changes clients request will lead to a logical discussion of this decision and set a precedent for decisions going forward.

Document All Decisions

Written approval statements for all freelance work that will have multiple deliverables is crucial to ensure previous work does not get revisited due to client unhappiness.  If a verbal agreement was made, follow up with your client with an email just clarifying that the component has been approved.  This workflow has been improved by multiple web apps for web designers such as GetSignOff made by the guys at Headscape and ProofHQ.

The Goods

As freelancers, you will encounter a variety of problems none of which will be more painful then decision by committee.  By using the four techniques outline; holding separate stakeholder interviews, defining vision, establishing yourself as the expert and documenting all decision – you’ll have little trouble combating this problem.  Let me know of the worst decision by committee experience you’ve had below in the comments.

A contract is a necessity when engaging in a freelance agreement to ensure your safety and help establish expectations between you and the client.  A great contract will give you a solid foundation, boost credibility as a professional and gain experience.  Ensuring clear terms of payment, deliverable expectations, intellectual property rights and limitation of liabilities are essential to the success of your contact.

First, let’s look at the contract at a glance and then dive a little deeper into some more important sections.  At the end, I’ll attach a copy of my contract as a reference if you wish to create your own.

Contract Overview

The must-have elements of any freelance contract should be: Overview, Terms of Service, Schedule, Payment Terms, Maintenance and Limitation of Liabilities.  Putting the elements in this order creates a logical flow from introduction to details to ending.  It’s also important to reference the client throughout the document so he/she understands what is required of them and you aren’t left with unclear expectations.

Overview

The Overview section is the equivalent to your first professional impression with the new client.  Party and service identification should be the major goals of this section. You should identify yourself as a Contractor to communicate that this is a one time engagement. I’ve also found success stating customer satisfaction policies in this section.

Terms of Service

The Terms of Service should accomplish one goal – a clear statement of the work to be accomplished.  The scope and authorization criteria should all be stated in this section.

The Scope of Services section will state the services you will render.  Packaging your services by focusing on the output is key for client understanding.  I normally use this section to specify the level of browser support.

In the Authorization section, the items the client will need to provide you with before work can be documented.  Common items I list here are access, copy and corporate images.  This reference in the contract will clear up most discrepancies on needs from the client.

Schedule

The focus of the Schedule and Payment Terms sections should be on the business side of the project.  These sections are the 2 most important sections to most clients because it enables them to assess the value of the engagement.  The major goal of these sections is to ensure project value to the client.

A Schedule will provide some accountability to your work, allowing the client to feel safe because there’s a timeline for completion.  A great practice is to focus on the delivery dates for the different outputs.  Be sure to set a realistic timeframe for deliverable completion and emphasize that these dates are dependent on timely communication and authorization by the client.

Payment Terms

When I first started freelancing, I required an equal portion of the payment upon the completion of deliverables before starting work on the next.  This practice gives clients freedom not to pay a deposit while still protecting me from being burned by bad clients.  I’d recommend this practice to new freelancers without an established portfolio.

In the Payment Terms section, all payment requirements should be identified.  Required deposits should be stated, as well as the rest of the terms of payment.  Identifying the timeframe of payment after invoice receipt will help you receive payments in a more timely fashion.

Maintenance

The Maintenance section is not necessary, but you will thank me for including it.  If no maintenance terms are stated, many clients will expect you to perform constant upkeep to the site or assist them with other types of support.  Stating rates for website support and other types of technical support will help shield you from clients assuming free assistance. This section will prove its worth the first time an old client contacts you for assistance with Outlook.

Limitation of Liabilities

The Limitations of Liabilities section will identify the intellectual property rights and state criteria for termination regarding both parties.  It’s also good practice to state you will not be responsible for any disruptions to the client’s current operations.  See my contract for more details.

Intellectual property rights should give you full ownership rights to all items generated from the start to end of the contract term.  It is also recommended that you mandate the client can not reuse or resell any items resulting from the engagement.

The Goods

The most important goal to set for your contract is to provide a sense of buy-in for your new client.  It’s essential to communicate what is required of your client so they understand the entire process.  Having a contract is now vital for freelancers to protect you if a negative situation arises.

Now what you were waiting for, a sample contract.  Enjoy and let me know what you think in the comments!

Sample Freelance Contract.docx

Sample Freelance Contract.doc

Sample Freelance Contract.rtf

Sample Freelance Contract.pdf

Disclaimer: I am in no way trained or qualified in the field of law or contract law.  My contract has been reviewed by a lawyer, but I should not be held liable for any contract issues that may result from the use of this contract.

So, think you are ready to take on the web world and become the next freelance all-star? You better learn fast that you are swimming with sharks ready to devour you without even blinking. Before taking the plunge, be sure to polish up these six crucial skills.

Passion

This one should be obvious, if you don’t have passion for what you are doing, change what you are doing.  Passion is what I refer to as the light at the end of the dark tunnel.  You will have to have passion to get you through the rough spots.  There will be times when it’s 4:00am and you are stuck trying to get your navigation hover state to look exactly how you want it.  Passion is will help get you through the bad times and amplify the feeling during the good times.

Pursuit of Knowledge

A curious nature will be a large asset to web developers and designers.  Methods come and go in waves and your goal should be to stay on top of or ride the wave and get back out on the next one.  New methods will always be developed to solve an old problem, new code libraries will come that will solve problems faster, new things come as time goes by and wanting to actively learn these will only help you out in the long run.  Knowing different ways of solving the same problems will allow you to see a problem from different sides giving you the upper hand on choosing the best solution.  It will also help you when communicating with buzzwordy clients who think they are experts, but are just familiar with trends in development/design.

Emotional Intelligence

I have talked to too many clients who say they are worried about working with freelancers because  freelancers can’t work well with people.  This connotation is negatively reinforced by freelancers who can’t work well with people and it turns into one of those situations where the bad people ruin it for the good.  Having emotional intelligence helps out the case for the good people.  Emotional intelligence plays a crucial role in your ability to communicate and work effectively in a professional environment.  If you are unable to tell what a client (or potential client) is really trying to say to you, then you are going to be hard pressed to find any work.

Work-Life Balance

This is the one skill that I struggle with the most on this list.  Being a college student with a full time part time job and then working on freelancing and developing this blog seems to take up the majority of my time.  Work-life balance is key to developing yourself as a person and ensure that you do not become your work.  Speaking from experience, as my work-life balance gets better the number of mental blocks I hit decrease and I seem to have more of the eureka moments.  Work-life balance is definitely a hard skill for lots of people in the industry, but a great work life balance will go a long ways for you.

Business Savvy

Business savvy freelancers are always more successful than their counterparts.  Understanding who are the influencers and decision makers for web content and how to grasp business politics in a quick manner are skills that will go a long ways.  You’ll find that as you work with different clients, some skills you learn are non-transferrable and will only apply to those type of clients.  Business savvy is most definitely a transferable skill that will work with bull headed law firms or small private colleges looking.  Being able to communicate what you are doing effectively in “english major” terms will be a skill that should not be overlooked.

Caffeine Addiction

Lastly and almost as important as passion, you must have a caffeine addiction  You really don’t need one of these, but it will help you as you find yourself doing work later and later into the night.  Many other freelancers I know swear by either a specific energy drink or coffee to get them through work sprints.

The Goods

I hope you work on polishing up these six skills before you start freelancing.  Having the opportunity to develop many of these skills through other real world experience was valuable to me as a freelancer.  What skills do you feel are valuable to tune before you enter into your own freelance business?  Let me know in the comments.