Keeping good time – Scheduling Web Design Projects

On any given day, we here at AKT have to meet all kinds of deadlines- hourly, daily, weekly, monthly and even annually.  I’d like to talk about web development deadlines, specifically.  Over the years we’ve worked on our fair share of small (1 to 2 week turn around) and large (2 to 6 month turn around) projects; however, the smallest delay of a project of any size can cause serious scheduling conflicts.

Let’s assume you are running a studio staff similar to StudioAKT, with two or three full-time designers, two full-time programmers and a part time flash developer.  If you are juggling multiple projects and working your entire team at capacity every day, the smallest delay in one project can cause a domino effect on your current work load. 

There are three things that can help you avoid the little problems that lead to project delays.

1. Don’t over book yourself
2. Spend more time planning
3. Limit revisions

Don’t over book yourself 

Leave plenty of time for each project.  Think about how long a project will take if you were working on it exclusively, without breaks- then double (or triple) that time frame.  Using this rule of thumb helps keep your other projects from being pushed back due to unforeseen circumstances.   

Spend more time planning  

Take more time before a project begins to outline every aspect of the project.  Although tedious and sometimes unnecessary on your end- many times the customer assumes features and functionality that you did not plan on. 

Limit revisions 

With web design in particular, it’s in everyone’s best interest to get a full site outline (navigation, pages, sub-pages, etc), style example (grungy, metallic, cartoony) and style concept (warfare, clouds, doodles) before agreeing on a deadline or price. There is always room for misunderstanding, so it’s my advice that you limit your revisions for each page mock up you provide. 

It will always be difficult to predict the unpredictable, however, by minding these three things, I think it will keep your design studio on track and under control- or at least help!