Finishing A Project

Have you heard these things before?  “We are almost done.” “Are we done yet?”  The creative team and the client always say the same things.  How do we evaluate “We are almost done”? This is tough to do when the Client is asking “Are we done yet”…. 2 weeks before the prototype.

Some of the best advice I have for this common problem is Under promise & Over deliver.  It is really hard to learn how fast your team works.  Every project is different, with unique timelines.  A simple project board website like Trello goes a long way.  This is a site that you can use that can assign tasks and timelines to individual members of your team.

Going back to Post #2 communication of what is left and needed from both the client and creative team are essential for a somewhat accurate timeline.

I think one of the most important things is to make sure the client knows that the things they want to add last minute may not be as cheap and easy as they think.  Try going to your developers and say…”Hey guys can you add backend security and a shopping cart to this website real quick?”  I promise it won’t go over very well.  Make sure that you re-address the goals of the client regularly. This will hopefully prevent some of the changes on the fly that clients always want to do.

Sometimes you have to remind both parties that what you are working on is what was agreed upon at the beginning of the project, when the quote was made.  Hopefully you don’t have to send the contract again show them what they have forgotten.

Lastly be open to changes.  You will end up getting a better product most of the time.  Just make sure everyone knows “you’re not there yet.”