If you work with clients on a Freelance basis for any period of time, you will start building your own horror stories about your "Clients From Hell" and wonder how everything suddenly went wrong. Our goal is to help you change that and make your Clients from Hell become your absolute best clients.
We'll be going over principles, processes and precautions to incorporate into your interactions with clients to help you:
• Prepare more carefully when scoping your projects to catch the issues before they get out of hand
• Engage more thoughtfully with communication and become more aware of problems in the project pipeline
• Pump up your Contracts with the proper precautions to protect you and your business, just in case you get into problems with a client that can't be fixed.
We won't be doing any Client bashing stories; the primary focus of this discussion is to be aware of the warning signs for particular types of clients so you can turn them into good clients.
2. Our Team of Freelancers
Jim True,
Project Manager & Support Lead, Pods
Framework
@jimtrue
Allison Foxhall,
Owner/CEO, GobbleLogic
@afoxhall
Thomas Giella,
owner, Gearspinners
@tgiella
Andrew Norcross
Lead Developer,
Reaktiv Studios
@norcross
32. the SCOPE Creeper
● can’t we just?
● just one more
thing
● Scope is
always a
moving target
33. the SCOPE Creeper: WEAKNESSES
● charge for
scope changes
● CLEAR
project
milestones
● focus on the
GOAL
● get it in
writing
34. SUMMARY
✘ Remember your Toolkit (Identify Expectations, Communicate
Regularly and Document EVERYTHING)
✘ Get good at identifying the Problems during the Interview Phase;
you can debug & deal with the bad clients much easier earlier in the
project.
✘ Protect yourself with good contract language: Build project phases,
timelines, deadlines, payment milestones and expiration clauses into
your contract language.
35. Special thanks to Nathan Ingram @nathaningram
http://www.slideshare.net/nathaningram/the-freelance-ninjas-guide-to-clients
Also check out, Stories from Clients From Hell:
ClientsFromHell.net
thanks!
36. Additional Thanks to:
Iron Yard Tampa
St Pete Campus
Campus Director,
Toni Aliberti
@theironyard
Thanks for hosting us
every other 1st
Thursday of the Month
Tampa Bay WordPress
& WordCamp Tampa
WordCamp Tampa 9/25-27
USF Marshall Student Center
tampa.wordcamp.org
WordPress Meetups:
meetup.com/Tampa-Bay-WordPress