From OrganicDesign Wiki
Work agreements are based on the Manifesto, but refine or add various aspects specific to the work
1 Introduction
When working with external clients who are not directly involved with the project, we can extract relevant parts of our manifesto as the basis of a work agreement specific to the client. Generally we only like to work with directly aligned organisations, but sometimes we find ourselves in relationships with non-aligned organisations when their alignment turns out over time to be opinion based, but is not reflected in their activities and decisions.
2 Charging & Payment
We do not charge corporate rates for our services, and expect a reasonable level of trust in our abilities with regard to the work being done. This trust is reflected by prompt "no quibbles" payment upon receipt of invoice. The amounts charged are directly based on the hours of work that have already been done on the job or items that have already been paid for by those doing the work. Haggling about whether this or that should be paid for is unacceptable in this situation because it lowers the agreed value of the work being done, and therefore requires the original terms to be renegotiated.
- Related note - I'm in the middle of one of these very stresses right now, and it seems to me that the biggest stress about it all is simply that time has to be consumed on aspects other than the work itself. Its a feeling very similar to having to reinstall windows halfway through a job - it's the feeling of disorganisation. --Nad 21:27, 28 Nov 2006 (NZDT)
We do not charge corporate rates for our services I sure as hell do charge corporate rates. Suggest we change this to "We charge professional rates for our services." this is a work agreement, not a marketing effort. --Phalseid 14:04, 7 Feb 2007 (NZST)
3 Quotes & Agreements
Our process of arriving at a job description and terms is to begin a stub specifically for the job which will become more refined through discussion on its talk page between the various roles involved. The main page will become an overview of the agreement and a repository for related links and information concerning the job. The job commences after all questions and concerns have been addressed to such a degree that all roles involved are happy to commence and have added their signature to the relevant section of the article.
In IT fixed quotes can only be given if the job is a well defined pattern, for most jobs there is a very significant chance of unforeseen problems or technical difficulties consuming many chargeable hours. Whether or not its a fixed quote is always clearly marked and signed off by all roles involved in the original agreement. Sometimes these unforeseen circumstances require the original agreement to undergo change throughout the job, when this happens, these changes must become a separate clearly marked and timestamped section which is discussed and signed off with the same process as the first one.
Sometimes these unforeseen difficulties are so extreme that the original job specification must be re-addressed and maybe the original goal abandoned if the unforeseen problems turn out to be too costly to resolve. That would be an unfortunate circumstance, but would still require complete payment of all the hours worked with no discount whatsoever - the hours have still been done, and even in this situation haggling about those hours is unacceptable because it shows mistrust in the decisions the specialist made to minimise the problems. It may well be that there is such a mistrust, and it may or may not be justified, but either way this mistrust is an indication that the original terms be renegotiated or that the relationship should be terminated.
4 Organisational systems
If the employees of a company are to begin using an organisational system, this requires regular meetings to discuss the details of implementation of the organisational systems as well as any concerns the people might have. Regular training sessions to ensure people are making the most out of the technology are essential. This does not need to be ongoing, just until people are familiar with using workflows, from there the learning can take place within the system. The main objective of initial training is to make sure people are comfortable using the system and are using it regularly.
Part of any organisational system is that roles be clearly defined and distinct from the people that perform them. Also, the roles and responsibilities of the system itself must be clearly defined and accessible from the main page.
It is also very important that the boss is the most enthusiastic user of said system and is therefore able to spread the enthusiasm by leading by example. We facilitate collaborative processes and can supply the technology for this, as well as help implement the organisational systems with training and documentation. We do not deliver one-click, push-button solutions which can be implemented without training or effort, in fact experience in the field shows that no such solutions exist currently.
When people in a company begin working together using organisational systems, conversations can easily turn into projects or new documents, feedback can be captured and responded to as it happens, with the organisation gaining a more complete description of all its roles, processes and resources as well as developing a repository of documents for internal use or publishing, which is often referred to as "content management".
