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This episode of Overgivers anonymous is about “scope creep”. If you work on a project for a client, and you outline what that project is going to be, you know what the job entails, you’ve agreed on a price and then somewhere along the way, you just start adding things for free. That’s what scope creep is all about. But scope creep is different than just over-delivering. It’s not just giving them something a little extra. When scope creep actually happens,you are undervaluing yourself. You’re doing it for free because you don’t think they’ll pay. Because you don’t think that you’re valuable enough to ask for more money.
Another thing that happens when we allow this scope creep to go on is that we are showing our clients that we don’t have boundaries. That it’s okay to walk all over us, no matter what they asked of us, we’re just going to say yes. We are the yes, men and women of the world.
You might have boundaries in place in your mind, you might think “okay, if they cross that line, I’m going to be upset”, but you’ve never let them know what the line is or enforced the line when they stopped over it. When we do not let people know what our boundaries are, how do they know what they are?
When you start out creating boundaries, it feels uncomfortable to create the boundaries. And our boundaries change, they move, things happen, and it’s okay for you to change what your boundaries look like. Don’t expect that the boundaries that you create today are going to still serve you in five or ten years because they won’t, you’re going to change. In order for you to maintain your boundaries, you have to keep explaining the boundaries.. and part of it is that you’re reinforcing it with your own brain, so that when you see a boundary being misused or walked over, you can look at that boundary and say “No, I don’t like that”.
The other part of how scope creep occurs is when you’re not managing the scope of the project, to begin with. If you’ve written it down, you know what it’s supposed to be about, you know how many hours you think you’re going to put towards it, and you’ve decided on the amount of money. But if you continue to allow that project to outgrow that, chances are you’re not paying attention, not keeping track you’re just doing it.
Managing your scope is simply making sure you’re following it. You already wrote it down, you said what was going to be included and you figured out how much time it’s going to take. You need to keep track of those expectations both on your side and theirs. Throughout the process of the project, keep an eye on what you said you would cover. Keep an eye on what you expected from them in order for you to complete your job. By having this project in front of you, by knowing what it is that you’ve decided, that you’ve both agreed that will be covered, it’ll be so much easier for you to acknowledge what’s way outside of the scope.
Now, there’s also a thing called scope kill. There are business owners that take the cope of the project and NEVER waver, there is no over-delivering either!, if the project says X, Y, and Z and they just do X, Y and Z. To an overgiver that’s completely different from who you are as a human being. You don’t need to go to that extreme. Having flexibility is important and being able to over-deliver is great. If something takes a little bit of time, it’s okay to say, “yeah, that’s awesome. Let’s do that as included in the project”. Never say free and it should never cause you to lose money or faith in yourself, pride in your work or credibility with your client.
We over-deliver to say to our clients, we appreciate you. We like working with you, you’re fun but when we overgive, and we allow the scope creep to come in, we’re saying something completely different. Now we’re saying, I don’t feel like you will value me if I ask you for more money. So go out there, get some projects going, be awesome with everything you do, manage the scope of the project, and over-deliver. But never allow that scope creep to take over your business!
You are worthy, you are amazing. You’re phenomenal. And you are such an amazing human being. Go shine, and allow everybody else to see how amazing your work is.
