Session List

Client-provider success factors

Track: 
Business and Strategy
Experience: 
Beginner

This session focuses on client-provider success factors.

When clients want help with Drupal, the nature of the clients' needs are not always clear — even in the client's mind. The Drupal provider is often faced with everything from no written requirements, all the way to a phone book-sized document.

Turning a concept into a functioning website is more than a set of specifications.

The presentation addresses the success-factors, choices, and pitfalls both the client and provider face in the web development process. The presentation will focus on real-life situations, not abstract or theoretical ones.

Session open to Drupal firm and client alike.

Intended audience: 

The target audience is clients and providers. On the Drupal side, it ranges from the solo-shop all the way to one where client relations are handled by a specialist. On the client side, it is from the one-person client all the way to the Fortune-50 firm.

It is intended for those who want to save time and ensure that the client-provider relationship is smooth, less time consuming, and successful.

Questions answered by this session
Question 1: 
What is an effective RFP? How to interpret and parse what is required and what's between the lines or not mentioned at all, but should be.
Question 2: 
What makes for a good project/vendor match? This will focus on how to access the match between what the client wants and the provider's capabilities. Setting expectations.
Question 3: 
How to avoid, or at least effectively manage, scope creep? How unspoken needs can appear at anytime in the process and how to manage them. Setting the groundwork (question 1 and 2) will minimize, but probably won't eliminate scope creep, but the better these first two question-topics are addressed, the less stressful scope creep requests will be.
Question 4: 
What are some of the best communication strategies? In short: how, where, when, how often, should I talk/communicate with my client or provider? What sort of facts should I bring to their attention? When should I make decisions without their input? This is the crux of the on-going relationship — the make-or-break of client satisfaction and provider profitability.
Question 5: 
How do I expect the unexpected? Unforeseen circumstances can happen. Even the best written Scope of Work (SOW) or contractual; agreement won't cover everything, and even if they do, there are human factors that go beyond what was put on paper when the work began. The groundwork (questions 1 thru 4) will be the foundation for dealing with the unexpected.
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What's Happening

Sunday, March 6

  • Badge Pickup and On-Site Registration

Monday, March 7

  • Pre-Conference Training
  • Exhibit Hall Opening Reception
  • Badge Pickup and On-Site Registration

Tuesday, March 8

  • Dries Buytaert Keynote
  • Sessions, Core Conversations, Birds of a Feather, and Day Stage
  • Opening Night Party at the Field Museum

Wednesday, March 9

  • Clay Shirky Keynote
  • Sessions, Core Conversations, Birds of a Feather, and Day Stage

Thursday, March 10

  • Jared Spool Keynote
  • Drupal Means Business
  • Sessions, Core Conversations, Birds of a Feather, and Day Stage
  • Drupal Trivia Night

Friday, March 11

  • Sprints

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