5 Important Steps to Improve Freelance Project Success

Individuals and organizations are more and more leveraging freelance platforms to hire freelancers to get the work done. The freelance platforms once used to execute simple work have matured and now capable of executing large scale enterprise projects. However, there are varying degrees of success, especially when it comes to large projects that take months or multi-person effort.

At FreelancingTeams, we have perfected the model for better success by following a few steps. These steps will help you to mitigate the risks upfront and put your project into a better path to success.

Define project success

In general, the project is considered successful when it produces intended results, completed timely, and within budget. Depending on the nature of the project, sometimes other factors such as quality, security, or performance are also included in the success criteria. By defining and setting realistic goals would help put the project in the right direction for success. 

Define the requirements clearly

One of the most important factors impacting project success is the scope of work or requirements. This is much more prevalent in working with remote teams. One common problem we see with most platforms is they collect a one-big general description of the project. This works well for smaller projects, but if it is larger, this post severs constraints in understanding the full scope of work, leading to many assumptions. This further leads to huge variations in the estimates, leading to confusion and chaos during execution.

At FreelancingTeams, we break down the projects into smaller “chunks” called features. This helps to think through the process from a user perspective and create better documentation. This helps the teams to come up with realistic estimates and execute them with more clarity.

Divide big project into smaller projects

If you’re working with a fairly large project or product that may take months to complete, then it is better to split it into smaller projects or sprints. Creating smaller projects keeps a narrow focus on a smaller set of features, instead of an entire big project. This also helps to fail fast, if needed. The theory is, if you cannot get a small piece of work done, how to expect a large work done? This is where a product roadmap may come in handy.  Creating a project roadmap helps to keep track of big vision while working through the smaller pieces. Read more