Appreciation post: the 3-strike rule saved my sanity with a nightmare client

Had a client who kept changing scope mid-project, adding 5 extra revisions after the agreement was signed. I started tracking every request as a 'strike' and warning them upfront, and after strike three they actually stopped pushing. Has anyone else tried setting hard limits like that?

3 comments

3 Comments

kevinw947d ago

Ha, the baseball strikeout sign is genius! I just started documenting every request in a shared doc with timestamps so they couldn't pretend they didn't ask for it. Once they saw everything in writing with dates, the scope creep magically stopped.

sanchez.julia7d ago

My first strike with a client was when they asked me to "just tweak the logo color" which turned into a full rebrand. By strike three I had a spreadsheet tracking every single change and a countdown timer on my desk. I even made a little cardboard "strike out" sign like in baseball, felt ridiculous but it worked. Definitely beats the alternative of crying into my coffee at 2am.

paige_craig4d ago

That spreadsheet trick works until they ignore it, then you send the bill for every strike.