(Photo by William Warby)

A client contacts you and wants your help solving their problem. They asked around and were told that it would take about a half-hour to solve it. They’re willing to pay you for your half-hour of time, but no more. Should you take the job?

If you’re well aware of the client’s underlying assumptions, the true scope of the problem, and are confident in your ability to perform that task in the given time, take the job.

However, in most cases you’re asking for trouble.

Solving a problem requires (at least) three steps: analysis, execution, and verification. If the problem is poorly specified, then you’re likely to make bad assumptions which will result in your work being rejected (“That’s not what I meant”). So, your first step is to get a clear specification to aid your analysis. Next, you’ll need to estimate how much time it will take to verify the result of your work. For example, if your client wants you to update a part of a website, how much time are you willing to spend to ensure that it works on a wide variety of browsers?

Odds are the person who’s specified the problem doesn’t truly understand the effort to truly solve the problem. When someone asks for an estimate of time, most people only focus on the execution phase – the time necessary to do the specific task. However, a professional will ensure that adequate time is allocated to solve all the phases.

If you’re asked to provide an estimate, ground the estimate in reality. Otherwise you’ll only disappoint your clients and colleagues.