Self-Promotion
Show off what you're working on
Start new thread

How do you budget review rounds before accepting another client project?

by•

A delivery estimate needs room for briefing, client questions, feedback rounds and handoff. Here is a capacity check that a solo service provider can use before agreeing to another request.

Start with the hours available this week. Subtract business admin, an interruption allowance and work already promised to clients. Then compare a working estimate for the new request with a slower estimate.

Illustrative example. Start with 32 working hours. Subtract 7 for admin, 5 for interruptions and 8 for booked client work. That leaves 12 hours. A request estimated at 5 hours leaves 7. If it takes 7.5 hours, it leaves 4.5.

The useful decision is what that smaller remainder has to cover. List the other deadlines due that week, including review and handoff. If 4.5 hours leaves too little room, reduce the first delivery or agree a later start. Keep the interruption allowance in both estimates so that a slower project does not silently consume it.

I’m a maker of SoloHatch. This is the method behind our free browser calculator, which lets you compare the two estimates without signing up.


The companion guide includes a weekly worksheet and the worked example.


For feedback rounds, do you budget a fixed number of hours, an allowance per round, or a range? What helps you keep that estimate close to the actual work?

6 views

Add a comment

Replies

Best

I do consulting next to my own products, and what saves my week is less the estimate and more how fast I turn things around. Client requests usually get done the same day, so they never pile up into long review rounds. Keeping the interruption allowance in both estimates makes sense, that's usually the first thing to get eaten.