I’m a big fan of the postmortem in making me a better developer, but I’m usually a little nervous to have them since I’m usually the lead programmer, and managed most of the project outside the money issues. I’m the only one to get the blame for failures.
It seems like at the end of every project, the final conclusion is always “we should have had a better statement of work”
Seems like I would have that one figured out by now.
Haacked is completely right though. Most of the projects that I’m working on now don’t have a ship date. They just transition into a new phase of the project - be it maintenance or adding features.
I do have those SOWs down though. You bill by the hour, keep track of every little thing you did. If you spent 15 minutes writing an email to explain how to use the system, you can bill for that later. At the end, just send them your spreadsheet of every hour you worked and bill. I love working like that because timelines and scope-creep are no longer issues. Blissful.