Hiring a Learning Consultant? Test the Waters with a Scoping Contract

Hiring a consultant you’ve never worked with before is a big commitment. You want to be confident you’re getting the right Instructional Designer or Learning Consultant for the job and the best fit for your organization. That’s why I recommend asking your contractor to complete a scoping or small prototyping project first—it’s a great way to test the waters for both parties.

Some recent scoping examplesI’ve had the chance to scope out small, medium and large-scale learning projects, ranging from a few hours of LMS administrator training for a non-profit group, to a company-wide data privacy training strategy for a national airline carrier. One all-employee eLearning program took 10 hours to scope and estimate, based on the amount of existing content available at the time. For a healthcare provider instructor-led coaching program, a few hours of scoping was adequate.

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In each situation, prototyping or conducting a trial project was helpful for both me and the client to make more accurate estimates and feel confident about working together on a larger project plan.What does a learning or training scoping project look like?Typically, the scoping quotations I offer include the following:

• A training needs analysis: An interview that answers the big project questions and your requirements. Here are some of the questions I ask in the needs analysis phase.
• Content discovery: A dedicated period to peruse, read and explore existing content. This often allows me to identify any content gaps before a project starts, too. (This will save you even more time and effort.)
• A detailed estimate: Includes estimates of time and effort for my consultant hours as well as resource estimates for internal resources. This is a bonus for your budget planning—not all consultants provide this!)
• Signing of any None Disclosure Agreement (NDA) or contract language: Protects your content or intellectual property.
• A draft workback schedule or high-level timelines and project milestones: This will be our collaborative road-map to prepare for due dates, incoming work, and to block off time in calendars (both for me and your team)
• A detailed list of recommended deliverables: Often includes tiered options (basic, mid-range, advanced) and the pros/cons of each tier.

Benefits of scoping projects for organizations​Not sure if your timeline and estimates are realistic or how much your complete project might cost? Engage a learning strategist or instructional design contractor for a few hours to scope it out with (or for) you. It’s easier to secure a small budget for a scoping project or a prototype or draft learning build than for the entire project at once.
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Consultants are well-versed at drafting proposals and estimating hours and effort. If you’re struggling with putting this together, or simply want to confirm your estimates with the person who may execute the project, ask the consultant to provide a quote

This not only gives you a chance to see how you and the consultant work together, but it gives both parties a chance to confirm the project plan before diving in.Benefits of scoping projects for consultantsA trial project allows me to get to know the client and their content. For example, the degree of flexibility and responsiveness about a group can say a lot, and increase the enjoyment of working together too. As much as possible I choose clients that commit to predetermined turnaround times to provide their feedback so that my work isn’t held up.

​After I’ve completed a scoping project, it’s often much faster to start on the actual work, because we’ve already confirmed the finer details of the contract language, payment, and communication channels and frequency, so we can just dive in.