Thanks for the reply! I think your answer has me a little bit more confused. You mention that you get the hiring manager to sign off on the SOW or BRD. I am suprised they would have the authority to do this but not sign a contract. I wouldn’t Think a contract would help you get paid for invoices necessarily. At the end of the day the invoice is probably less than the cost of enforcing the contract. I would be concerned about my liability if I was acting without a contract. For example, let’s say I get sick and miss a milestone. This missed milestone costs the company $X in revenue. A good contract would have language that protects me from this. Without a contract you might be left on the hook( or paying a lawyer handsomely)
They don't actually sign anything. They just need to have any positive response via email followed by a paid invoice, that's enough for the client to be in contract with me should we ever end up in court. Given that I invoice on a weekly basis, there's not much risk on my side. The only risk is that I ruin their business by badly implementing their supply chain or similar but I have liability insurance to cover this.
Everything I do is on a time and materials basis and the client get an invoice every week so there's no real way for them to claim I haven't delivered scope etc. I also make the client test everything that I deliver and tell me, via email, that they have accepted it.
I do understand the usefulness of a contract but my many years at Accenture showed me that contracts don't stop you from having to go to court and spend a lot to defend yourself. I am not against signing a contract with a client, it just makes it harder to sell and it locks me into terms and conditions. No contract gives everyone a lot of flexibility.
Alan Weiss takes the same approach. If I were to enter in to a large piece of fixed scope work with an enterprise client, I would likely get my lawyer to put together a master services agreement though.
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Thanks for the reply! I think your answer has me a little bit more confused. You mention that you get the hiring manager to sign off on the SOW or BRD. I am suprised they would have the authority to do this but not sign a contract. I wouldn’t Think a contract would help you get paid for invoices necessarily. At the end of the day the invoice is probably less than the cost of enforcing the contract. I would be concerned about my liability if I was acting without a contract. For example, let’s say I get sick and miss a milestone. This missed milestone costs the company $X in revenue. A good contract would have language that protects me from this. Without a contract you might be left on the hook( or paying a lawyer handsomely)
They don't actually sign anything. They just need to have any positive response via email followed by a paid invoice, that's enough for the client to be in contract with me should we ever end up in court. Given that I invoice on a weekly basis, there's not much risk on my side. The only risk is that I ruin their business by badly implementing their supply chain or similar but I have liability insurance to cover this.
Everything I do is on a time and materials basis and the client get an invoice every week so there's no real way for them to claim I haven't delivered scope etc. I also make the client test everything that I deliver and tell me, via email, that they have accepted it.
I do understand the usefulness of a contract but my many years at Accenture showed me that contracts don't stop you from having to go to court and spend a lot to defend yourself. I am not against signing a contract with a client, it just makes it harder to sell and it locks me into terms and conditions. No contract gives everyone a lot of flexibility.
Alan Weiss takes the same approach. If I were to enter in to a large piece of fixed scope work with an enterprise client, I would likely get my lawyer to put together a master services agreement though.