(2-minute read)

Overcommitting to a project, or underestimating a deadline is something that will happen to you at one point or another. Happened to me a lot when I was starting out, so please use my tactics to keep your project on time and on price - and yourselves happy while you're at it.

Undersell and overdeliver? Never!

For some reason, this is the common misconception, and you'll hear this a lot from people. In reality, clients rarely appreciate your extra effort, especially when you are doing your work remotely. Clients don't know everything that goes into your daily work, so it's hard to appreciate those little things you did to go above and beyond - but it cost you time and energy.

There was a science paper published in Social Psychological and Personality Science online titled "Worth Keeping but Not Exceeding: Asymmetric Consequences of Breaking Versus Exceeding Promises" by Ayelet Gneezy and Nicholas Epley.

Long story short, what did all this testing reveal? That if you're overdelivering with your customers, you're probably wasting effort. "Going above and beyond a promise didn't seem to be valued at all", said Epley, summarising the findings.

"Keeping a promise is valued so highly, above and beyond its 'objective' value," Epley says. "When you keep a promise, not only have you done something nice for someone but you've also fulfilled a social contract and shown that you're a reliable and trustworthy person."

Nail your estimates and deliver on (before) deadlines.

Be realistic about your capabilities, and then add some padding because life happens. One product owner I worked with called this "SWAGing" - that stands for "Scientific Wild Ass Guessing".

With time your SWAGing will get better as you go through a couple of similar projects, it will get easier to estimate type and quantity of work that goes into it. With time you'll even know where to cut corners, but try not to do that often, as it can result again in overestimating.

Being the person clients can count on should be one of the cornerstones of your brand. If you deliver fantastic work past deadline, for whatever reason, it will be viewed as sub-par work and will reflect poorly on you.

When starting a project with your client, there are two things you need to do to set yourself up for success:

1) Ask the right questions

If you just ask your client "what do you need", chances are you will get a wrong, confusing and incomplete answer. When clients tell you "I want a website" for example, that's just a part of what they need. Because what they need can be very different from what they want. You need to ask them what their goals are? What is the primary objective they want to achieve with this project? I doubt it's just to have a website for the sake of having a website.

2) Tell a good story

Your experience and knowledge of your craft are what gives you the confidence to deliver what clients need, but for them to know that too - you can't just say "Yes. I will do this for you for price X".

You need to tell them why you are this person they can trust, go beyond just bullet points and requirements. What are they getting when working with you? Results? Sure. Meeting deadlines? Yes. What else? Their success is your success, and you care about their customers as much as they do, and you have to make sure they are aware of that.

I read somewhere:

"People will not remember what you've said, but they will remember how you made them feel." I keep that in mind whenever speaking to a client, or anyone for that matter.

And then, everything that was said. You make a note of that. Put it in an email, and send it to the client to review and confirm, so you know you didn't miss anything and there's a written trail of what you agreed. More on that soon.

Have a great day!

T.

Tom Kozacinski, sir Freelance-a-lot

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