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When I began freelancing I thought it was important to make my fledgling business appear bigger and more established than it really was. My website used phrases like “our designers” and “our programmers” in an effort to make a one-man show look like a full team of professionals. No matter what a potential client wanted I felt the need to make them believe I had all of the resources to do it.
At Agency Fusion we’re fortunate to have some really great clients. For us, a great client is one who appreciates our experience and recognizes our expertise. We’ve been doing web development for years and years now (some of us since 1994) so we’ve definitely been around the block a few times. We recognize, however, that some would-be clients haven’t yet done enough web projects to be in a position to fully understand how web development works.
This is an attempt to draw a helpful analogy for the benefit of those who’d like to better understand how websites are (or should be) built.
Additionally, this is for the benefit of those of us who build websites so that perhaps we can better explain to our clients what it is that we do and why it pays to follow a thorough process!
I suspect most of you have experienced “scope creep” before. Scope creep begins at the moment when your client asks for something outside of the scope of work for which you’ve contracted (you do have a contract, right?). Naturally, they’re asking for this thing to be included at no extra cost. Actually, they’re probably not asking. They’re probably acting like it’s always been understood that this thing will be included. Duh.
Sometimes I think designers and programmers couldn’t be more opposite. At Agency Fusion our success depends on bringing these two worlds together but it sometimes feels like we’re trying to mix oil and water.
More than likely you’ve already had an experience dealing with an IT-type person that left you feeling a little frustrated.
Here are a few insights into the mind of the programmer, network admin, or other IT person. Hopefully this might help you the next time you find yourself wondering how to communicate with the IT species. Read the rest of this entry »