How I determine good project fit

(and why it took me so long to figure this out)

When I first started my agency, Prime Studio, 24 years ago it was an exhilarating moment. I’d been working as a designer in New York for 7 years, firstly at Smart Design where I always say I learnt how to design and then at Able Design where I learnt the business of design and I was ready for my next challenge.

I feel fortunate that now at Prime Studio we have a great team and some wonderful clients who really value what we bring to the table — but it wasn’t always that way.

So I’m going to tell you how we broke out of a downward spiral — that I had led us into.

Circumstances meant I didn’t have the chance to plan the launch of Prime as well as I could (and should) have. I had no capital, very little equipment and most importantly, no clients. This meant I was nervous — very, very nervous.

I believed in myself as a designer but I was nervous I’d be able to convince potential clients to take a leap of faith with an untested agency. I was nervous about spending all the savings I did have on the 3 month deposit for our first office and a photocopier. And I was nervous if I’d be able to provide for my wife and our upcoming baby.

Those nerves lead to some poor decisions on my part and a cycle of taking on some unsuitable clients and projects that took me a long, long time to break.

I was so worried about cash-flow that I would take on projects with budgets that were way too low, thinking that if we could ‘prove ourselves’ to the client then, as we developed a relationship, we’d be able to negotiate better budgets and project timelines. Let me tell you, that never happens.

Once you have set benchmark for a client’s expectations it is almost impossible to change that in any meaningful way. Moreover, after agreeing to a budget that is too low, it becomes an internal battle at the studio level to deliver good design solutions and make a reasonable profit. One of those metrics always suffers — and that’s not a happy place to be as an agency owner.

In addition to monetary worries I was just so excited by the opportunity to lead design projects and see our work out in the world that we took on some projects which had dubious design value for clients whose key driver was Cost-of-Goods not Quality-of-Product. The initial thrill of seeing our designs on shelves in stores soon was tainted by the realization that many of those products would be heading to a landfill before too long. This became an issue for team motivation and retention as no good designer wants to work on a project they don’t really believe in.

So I decided I needed to do something to put Prime on the path to being the kind of agency I’d originally dreamed of.

My solution was to develop a simple 10 point potential project checklist.

When I start a new notebook the first thing I do is to write this list onto the front page — not only as a reference but also to remind myself of how important it is as a guiding principle of doing business. Of course, the list has been nuanced slightly over the years but in essence it’s pretty similar to the one I first drafted many years ago.

The idea is to evaluate all potential projects against the points on the list to see how many and which combination they check off. We’ve never had a project which scored a 10/10. In fact I doubt that’s even possible but I want to see scores of at least 6, hopefully more, for us to move forward with submitting a proposal.

The 10 points are not particularly weighted by importance. In actuality, the beauty of the system is its flexibility and fluidity. The magic 6 or 7 points can, and do, change based on current projects, staff makeup, and business concerns.

Now, this method may not be particularly innovative and I’m sure there are many of you out there saying that we should have been thinking like this from the outset. I would certainly agree. But as the saying goes “hindsight is 20/20” which is why I continuously find that completing this simple exercise when evaluating new projects keeps us honest and on-track.

So, here’s my current list.

• Will the design team be excited ?
• Will we learn a new skillset or capability ?
• Is there a social good component ?
• Is there a sustainability focus ?
• Will it open up a new market segment for us ?
• Is it a portfolio project ?
• Is there a good Client personality fit ?
• Do we have the bandwidth ?
• Do we add real value ?
• Will we make a profit ?

As an example, a charity called A Leg To Stand On (ALTSO) which provides prosthetic limbs and services to children in developing countries came to us a couple of years ago to discuss optimizing their structural packaging. Here was our evaluation of the project we discussed with them :

• Will the design team be excited ? — CHECK
• Is there a social good component ? — CHECK
• Is there a sustainability focus ? — CHECK
• Is there a good Client personality fit ? — CHECK
• Do we add real value ? — CHECK

Here’s where the flexibility of the valuation system comes into play. We certainly didn’t have the bandwidth, we weren’t going to make a profit and because of cost-of-goods constraints it wasn’t going to be a glamorous portfolio project. That all being said, the checklist showed us that the positives outweighed the negatives. To remedy these obstacles, the team volunteered to work on the project on weekends so we could fit it into our schedule and we agreed to do the project pro-bono and it ended up being a super-rewarding experience for everyone involved.

On the other hand some of the work we do for our larger CPG clients is because of a different set of criteria — sustainability goals have to be approached with the realities of large volume production supply chains. However, that means that if we can influence our clients even slightly in favor of recycled material content or mono-material components then we can have a meaningful impact because of the large order volumes involved.

From a purely creative perspective these projects generally don’t get the designers juices flowing quite as much but, especially for newer members of the team, it’s invaluable to see how projects like this progress through a large corporation with all the checks & balances and considerations needed. Our designers can then use that experience and thoughtful approach with some of our startup clients who may be somewhat unfamiliar with the product development process. And, of course, those larger projects tend to be more profitable which, in turn, allows us the cashflow to take on those passion projects or ones with a social mission.

I hope this article has been helpful and I would love to hear what strategies other people are using to help guide their businesses.