prerequisites, prompts, and checklists

What type of information do you require from a client before beginning a project? What methods have you found most effective for extracting the critical details necessary to produce a product that they are pleased with and satisfies their needs? Do you use standard prerequisite forms or checklists?

I threw a quick one together a while back for web applications after another frustrating project of trying to read the clients mind and have been considering making a few other for identity development and other design projects. What works for you?

• wade
• 3 responses
•  Business

agreement of terms and conditions

What do you have in your standard terms and conditions agreement? What components do clients ususally require changes or more specific details added to? I used to have an eleven page monster, but have recently trimmed mine down to a single page. Anyone else willing to share? How do you go about getting a signed copy back? I had a client surprise me the other day returning it as a PDF, but it’s is pretty rare that they have the knowledge and ability to do that unfortunately. I don’t have a facsimile machine or even a land line (faxing seems so archaic), so I have to get creative.

• wade
• 11 responses
•  Business

asset and resource management

So, following up with the task and project management post, I am also curious as to what others are using for asset and resouce management. What systems to you have in place for versioning and archiving files? Does anyone use Version Cue? Do you use font servers? file servers? version control repositories? How do you handle comping and proofing? How do you manage stock, guides, swatchs, styles, and templates that entire teams use?

• wade
• 3 responses
•  Business

task and project management

What task and project managment systems are you using for both person projects and at work? Do you have a company-wide system or does the creative department have their own? What frustrations do you have regarding project management? What is working well for you? What are our local ad agencies and design studios using?

I have researched and tested more solutions then I can count and have tested many in production environments. I consider TaskPro to be the best for small team task management. It has the most pleasant and usable interface by far but does not do resource planning required by large organizations. We are currently using @task company wide, a program with incredible power and flexibility, but encounter many hurdles due to it’s very high learning curve and cumbersome interface. It has been the most effective system that I have implemented in regards to increasing communication and efficiency between departments however and only find myself wanting when considering some of it’s usability and asthetic weaknesses.

Other projects that I have tried or looked into are Copper, TeamWork, phpCollab, Basecamp, Eventum, dotProject, phpEasyProject, SimplyPM, Trac, activeCollab, Jira, Project.net. and eProject.

• wade
• 8 responses
•  Business