Andrew Clarke

8 Responses

1. What a great interview – and I discover Andy is only a hop, skip and jump away from me!

   I don’t have separate contracts for clients . I add contract terms to the proposal document I send and the signed proposal becomes the working contract.

   Probably need to get a view on the legality of this…………

2. Great episode. Hearing Andy talk about his approach to his work always leaves me with much food for thought. This time, I love the idea of a client paying for ‘taste’! So very true and something not often well articulated when talking to clients.

   Contracts. I’ve been hearing for years now that I should use contracts and if I don’t, I will live to regret it (incidentally, mostly from reading/listening to Andy and few others on the topic). Thinking about why I still don’t use them, it can be boiled down to two reasons:

   1. I’m still dealing with relatively small projects and budgets, so whenever I’ve experienced a very rare breakdown of any verbal agreement I’ve had with a client, it hasn’t been financially or emotionally damaging enough to have made me think ‘Right. Andy was right all along, contracts from now on!’. That said, I’m actively seeking ways to shift from being viewed as a small commodity-type service to something more encompassing and financially rewarding and perhaps having contracts will be an important part of me making that shift, as much psychologically as for the practical benefits.

   2. Every single piece of work I get is from word of mouth. I’ve never had a business card and never even a website (I realise that’s somewhat crazy for someone who does a lot of web design). I think this ‘vouched-for’, personal relationship that gets established early with my clients has given me sense of security in the ‘gentleman’s agreement’ approach. Perhaps a false sense? Though as I said above, in 15-odd years I’ve very rarely been in a situation where a contract would have helped. I think, tied-in with personal relationships with clients, is the idea that contracts somehow seem so formal and grown-up, and their very use removes some of that personality in a relationship. I realise this is ridiculous of course, and could be helped by using something like Andy’s contract killer which does a great job of humanising something usually so mechanical and also by improving my own approach to talking about contracts with my clients.

   As I type and think, I realise that having contracts is another small but neccessary step to helping me get to where I want to be professionally. Looks like Andy might well have been right all along..

3. Excellent program and very interesting question. I’ve been designing for 10+ years and have never used a contract although I am now inserting a fairly detailed “job scope” into my written estimates.

   In thinking about this, I’ve just now realized that I, too, have always placed a strong emphasis on “just being myself.” All the ways I make contact – email, phone, even the text on my website – for better or worse, is “just me.”

   I guess I’ve always assumed that a contract would be full of legalese, which is definitely “not me.” However, after seeing Andy’s contract, this clearly need not be the case. Thank you, Andy, for giving permission to protect myself and my client while still “being me.”

4. Great interview with Andy “Mr Webdesign!”

5. Nothing is stopping me from using contracts. In fact, a mixture of Andy’s contract, the WPElevation contract and my own has saved my bacon on many times!

6. Sensational interview. Thanks, Troy, for connecting us with the leaders in web. Great to hear perspectives outside of the WP ecosystem.

   Just proves that listening to podcasts can improve your life. I had never heard about GatherContent. Now that “discovery” is likely to reshape and drastically improve our entire content development workflow! And not just for websites.

7. I use contracts, but on less projects than I should. Andy’s contract killer was a brilliant insight into some of the same problems we always face—I used to have a contract based on the AIGA long form standard terms. One client didn’t want to sign it, telling me, “oh, I don’t want to deal with all this, contracts are so impersonal.” I let it go, and it was a mistake—that was the one time I had to fire an unhappy client. I found the long form hard to deal with, too, and wasn’t sure how to proceed. But seeing Andy’s approach helped me create something friendlier and more comprehensible. I keep fine-tuning it each time. What stops me from using the contract more? I suppose it’s laziness. And forgetting to have solid habits in place when initiating new work.

   Troy, great talk with Andy!

8. In the begging I tried all different kinds of contracts, basic, fancy click to sign I even tried snail mail. NOBODY ever signed & returned them to me!! I only sent them to a few to be honest but that kind of put me off using contracts & 3 years on I’ve never used one yet &/or had to.

   I will however be trying Andy’s contract killer on my next few clients to see how I get on. Obviously I should be using contracts & consider myself lucky to not have had a law suit thrown at me already! LOL!!

   Keep up the good work guys & please pick me to WIN THE COMPETITION as I never win anything!!! 😉

   Many Thanks,
   Robert Griffiths