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best product they’ll never be able to use. So, while this kind of change is expected, it is very important to
know how to manage it effectively. No designer wants his or her timelines in a constant state of flux,
especially when the budget isn’t. How, then, do we manage scope creep within a project? There is no
easy answer to this question, but there are a few strategies that might be useful to keep in mind.
Introducing Sign-Off
Once a particular deliverable has been finished and presented to a client, it is usually a good idea to ask the
client to formally “sign off” on the work. This sign-off can take the form of an e-mail from the client, min-
utes from meeting notes, or preferably a physical signed document. No matter the form it takes, it should
formally document the client’s approval of what has just been delivered. By securing the client’s sign-off on
a given deliverable, the client confirms that our work meets the requirements that the client set before us.
In effect, the client is telling us, “Yes, this is what we asked you to provide for us—let’s move on.”
Some designers might call this “blazing a paper trail.” The rationale frequently is one of offloading
accountability onto our client’s shoulders: that if any future changes must occur, the fault — and
incurred cost— lies not with us as consultants, but upon the client’s revised requirements. And, on the
face of it, this thinking has a lot of appeal. Whenever possible, we should toe a hard line with the estab-
lished scope, and ensure that the agreed-upon requirements change as little as possible before the pro-
ject’s completion. Sign-off is one way to help ensure this, enabling us to point to completed work should
we ever be asked to undertake time-consuming revisions.
Viewed in a more positive (and somewhat less mercenary) note, sign-off can be a valuable means to
increase the level of collaboration between consultant and client. Sign-off provides a scheduled touchpoint
for our clients, allowing them to check in on progress made to date. In this, the client almost becomes
another member of the project team. Formalizing the approval process integrates the client’s decisions into
the project lifecycle, and increases the level of interest the client has vested in maintaining the project’s
momentum.
And on the subject of momentum, sign-off is in itself a valuable device for maintaining a sense of progress
from project inception to final delivery. Over the course of a given project, you may find that most deliver-
ables cannot be built unless another has been completed. For example, it isn’t possible to begin building
HTML templates of our designs if the mockups haven’t been finalized — or rather, the template process
becomes extremely lengthy and expensive if the design is still undergoing revision. By requiring sign-off
on a particular phase of work before the next phase can begin, you can help ensure that your work is deliv-
ered on-time and on-budget. That should make parties on both sides of the negotiating table quite happy.
Refer Frequently to the Project Scope
While the scope statement enables us to define the requirements for our project, it also implicitly estab-
lishes what is not in the agreed-upon scope— a critical point when deadlines are tight and client expec-
tations high. It’s important to have established this baseline with your client.
This is where the collaboratively authored aspect of the scope document becomes most important. By
working closely with the client at the outset of the project to define its scope, the client has a more con-
crete understanding of how that scope (and any changes to it) will affect both pricing and timelines.
That’s not to say that this will mitigate any and all potential scope changes. Rather, it will help facilitate
any later reviews of the original proposal and allow both sides of the contract to more intelligently and
openly discuss how the new changes will affect schedule and pricing.
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The Planning and Development of Your Site
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