Imagine this scenario: You’ve handed your key deliverables off to your client and implemented their feedback. So you’re done, right? But as you go to prepare the final invoice, you realize you haven’t verified they’ve received everything they requested or even asked them what they thought of the finished course.
If you’ve ever found yourself in this position—unsure if your project is actually complete or if the client is happy—you know exactly what I’m talking about. While completing a project might seem intuitive, there are a few things you need to do long before calling it quits to ensure everyone’s on the same page and your clients will keep coming back for more. Let’s take a look.
1. Identify Completion Criteria
When you’re planning your project it’s important to define what completion looks like. Is it when you provide the published output to your customer? Or when it’s been successfully uploaded into their LMS and rolled out to learners? Whatever the answer, it’s important that both you and the client agree on it up front. This helps avoid extended deadlines, additional costs, and ensures your client walks away with a smile.
Creating a reusable checklist for wrapping up a project really helps. You can include things like:
- Course received final sign-off/acceptance
- Completed course provided to customer
- Course tested and shown to work as expected in LMS
- Course rolled out to learners
- All source files provided to client
- All administrative tasks and relevant paperwork complete
- Arrangements made for course maintenance and updates
2. Verify Completion Criteria
At the end of the project, go back to the completion criteria you identified during the planning stage and make sure you’ve checked all the boxes. This way you’ll be absolutely sure you’ve met your goals. And if you haven’t, it’ll give you a chance to tie up any loose ends. For example, maybe you go to verify completion and realize you forgot to share the audio source files. Using a checklist like this will ensure nothing slips through the cracks.
3. Debrief with Your Clients
Once you’ve verified completion, it’s time to ask your client if they’re happy with your work. After all, you want them to come back to you for all their e-learning needs, so whether they’re satisfied or not—you need to know!
A great way to ensure customer satisfaction is to schedule a follow-up meeting after the project to debrief. This gives you space to discuss what went well and where there’s room for improvement.
It’s best to have your debrief meeting while things are still fresh in everyone’s minds, so schedule it within a few weeks of completion. Some good things to talk about in the project debrief are:
- Did the project meet the client’s objectives and expectations?
- Was the client satisfied with the communication process?
- Were key deliverables provided on time?
- Did the project execution align with the agreed-upon project plan?
These are just a few ideas of things you might want to cover, but depending on the project, you might need to adapt this list of questions.
Wrap-Up
Finishing a project in a way that ensures client satisfaction involves a bit more than just sending the final invoice. If you follow the strategies outlined in this article, you’re more likely to walk away with happy clients. And hopefully that means they’ll be coming back to you when their next project rolls around!
Want more project management tips? Check out these articles:
- 6 Agenda Items for Your E-Learning Project Kickoff Meetings
- 3 Tips for Building an Effective E-Learning Project Team
- Keep Your E-Learning Project Moving Forward with These 3 Tips
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Published 3 years ago
Version 1.0
