RE: RE: Questions - Going from Hourly to Per Project Basis

["techwr" <techwr -at- genek -dot- com>]

I love the plumber analogy, and have used it on a number of
occaisions with clients as I prepare proposals for their
bids.  I point out to them that their plumber bids a fixed
price on a job, such as installing the piping for a shower,
but that they are expected to have the framing completed on
a specified date in order for the work to be done on time
and within budget, and if the plumber arrives on the
appointed date and the framing isn't ready, they still have
to pay the plumber for showing up on time and also pay for
the plumber to stand around waiting for framing or send the
plumber away and risk losing their time slot for the work.
What this translates into for a fixed price documentation 
project is that specified access to information has to be
made available on time in order for writing to occur, that
when they receive a draft they are supposed to review and
return it within the period spec'd on my project schedule
and with only the contracted percentage of revisions called
for, and if they don't it'll cost extra or they may find
that their writer is tied up with another project for a
different client when they're only 3 weeks away from product
release.  Or, they can just pay for a block of weeks and
hours and use their writer/plumber as if he's a regular
employee, trading off potential cost for idle time for
constant availability.  So far, I'd say the balance is 
about 70% opting to go hourly and only 30% going for
the per-project pricing.  But I do seem to have a rather
high balance of clients whose development schedules are
diplomatically best described as "fluid."

Gene Kim-Eng


------- Original Message -------
On
Wed, 1 Oct 2003 09:53:11 -0700 Sharon Burton-Hardin?wrote:


It isn't a project management issue, you have to know how much something
costs when you buy it. Just like when you hire a plumber to fix something,
you want to know what this is going to cost before the project starts.
Otherwise, it just costs "gobs of money" and that makes you very unhappy. It
does me, at least. I yell in this case.

If the client stops working on our part of the project and delays things
beyond our control, we roll to the clause of the contract that says
something like "Delays will add to the cost of the project." And then I
invoke that clause, after telling them this is going to happen, and they get
billed some weekly amount over the original total cost of the project until
they start doing what they agreed contractually to do. That usually moves
things right along. It costs the client money with no result for spending
that money. And we do have a contract that details what they do and what we
do. Not doing what they agreed to is technically violating the contract.


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